- Ethereum cofounder Vitalik Buterin tweeted Friday that he's no longer a billionaire.
- Crypto has crashed in recent weeks amid a broad sell-off in traditional markets.
- The crypto crash has wiped billions from the fortunes of prominent entrepreneurs.
Ethereum cofounder Vitalik Buterin tweeted Friday that he's no longer a billionaire.
Buterin, who cofounded the blockchain network in 2014, has seen its Ether token crash by 59% since hitting a high of around $4,800 in November 2021, when his holding was valued at around $1.5 billion.
In another tweet Friday, Buterin said: "Eventually you make a mistake in your beliefs, and (especially if you are in politics, but some other domains too) correcting that mistake means acknowledging that a previous version of yourself contributed negative value to the world."
He also discussed the tradeoffs between "open-mindedness" and "passion," while expressing support for the blockchain he helped create. "Note to trolls: no, ethereum was not a mistake," he wrote.
Insider reached out to Buterin via Ethereum but did not immediately receive a response.
The TerraUSD and LUNA tokens crashed dramatically last week, wiping an estimated $40 billion from the market in a matter of days. TerraUSD, a so-called "stablecoin" supposedly pegged to the value of the dollar, was last valued at about 6 cents.
Ether is the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization after Bitcoin, which has lost about half its value in the past six months and is about 60% below its record high of $69,000.
Cameron Winklevoss, a cryptocurrency and Bitcoin investor, tweeted on May 12: "It's days like this that I remind myself of when #Bitcoin was under $100 dollars. It's all about perspective and HODLing for the long game."
Buterin, a Russia-born Canadian programmer, is one of several high-profile casualties of a crypto collapse that has affected investors across the board. Three investors spoke to Insider about losing thousands of dollars last week.