Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, and an ally of Donald Trump, has accused a “finance gerontocracy” including Warren Buffett, Jamie Dimon, of preventing bitcoin’s growth.

In a keynote speech at the Bitcoin 2022 conference, Miami on Thursday, Buffett, multibillionaire tech investor, described Buffett as the’sociopathic grandfather from Omaha’.

Thiel’s speech began with an analysis on the investment merits cryptocurrencies, but quickly escalated to a tirade about the financial establishment, including the ‘bankrupted’ central banks, and the ESG ‘hate factory. ESG stands for environmental and social governance, and is a cornerstone responsible investing principles.

He said that ‘It is a movement and it’s not a political question whether this movement will succeed or whether the enemies are going to succeed at stopping us’, just before naming Buffett his ‘enemy number one.

He also mentioned JP Morgan’s chief executive Dimon, and Larry Fink (chair of investment group BlackRock), as saying that institutions run by a “finance gerontocracy” were hindering cryptocurrency. Thiel stated that choosing to not invest in bitcoin was a “deeply political decision” and that the financial establishment must be made aware of this. Thiel also stated that the $830bn ($PS638bn), bitcoin market could rival the global equity market which is worth more than $100tn.

He said that bitcoin was like conventional capitalism and he applauded, “Woke companies are quasi-controlled by government in a manner that bitcoin will never be.” Thiel, 54 years old, is Trump’s most prominent supporter. He donated millions to Trump’s 2016 campaign, and he also served on Trump’s transition team.

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Thiel concluded his speech by describing the political progress of bitcoin. He used a libertarian rallying cry to describe cryptocurrency’s success as a battle between ESG (electronic security group) and a “revolutionary youth organization”.

“If we had to summarize this, it would be… the finance gerontocracy, which runs the country through whatever silly virtue signalling and hate factory term they have like ESG, versus what I would consider a revolutionary youth movement.

He said, “We must just get out of this conference and take control of the world.”

Thiel declared in February that he would be stepping down from his position as a board member at Meta, Facebook’s parent company. Thiel, who has served on the Meta board since 2005, is a confidant to Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s founder.