Former IMF Economist Finally Closes Year-Old Bitcoin Short

A year ago today, Bitcoin peaked at $19,511.

Former International Monetary Fund economist and Pharo Senior Risk Trader Mark Dow made an unpopular bet not long thereafter: Bitcoin would not sustain its growth and the price would slip from there. He entered a short position and rode his intuition all the way to the bank, finally closing the position today. A big part of his intuition was the launch of Bitcoin futures trading.

Dow wrote a sort of guide on shorting Bitcoin around the time he’d opened his position. Not quite a week after the peak, he wrote:

First, bitcoin is volatile. It’s annualized volatility is over 100%, implying daily moves up or down of over 6%. Second, bitcoin exchanges are open 24/7, but bitcoin futures follow regular Globex hours. Third, the exchanges have integrity risk (e.g. Mt Gox) and the futures have 20% collars. These last two factors increase gap/discontinuous pricing risk for those who trade the futures, even though I suspect these…