Minneapolis Fed Chief Kashkari Blasts Cryptocurrency While Championing Artificial Intelligence
Neel Kashkari, President of the Minneapolis Federal Reserve, dismisses cryptocurrency as having zero utility when measured against AI, calling stablecoin advocacy "a buzzword salad."
The president of the US Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, Neel Kashkari, has characterized cryptocurrency as "utterly useless" when placed side by side with artificial intelligence, while also criticizing stablecoins for their limited practical applications.
During his appearance at Thursday's 2026 Midwest Economic Outlook summit, Kashkari made a stark contrast between artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency, stating that despite crypto "has been around for more than a decade, and it's utterly useless."
"AI has not been around very long, and people are using it every day," he added. "This is demonstrating to me that this thing is real and it has real long-term potential for the US economy as opposed to crypto."
According to Kashkari, the manner in which the cryptocurrency sector has presented the potential applications of stablecoins amounts to "a buzzword salad."
"I always ask people: What can I do with the stablecoin that I can't do with Venmo today?" he said. "I could send any one of you $5 with Venmo, or PayPal, or Zelle, so what is it that this magical stablecoin can do? Then I get a buzzword salad answer, blah blah blah, tokenized deposits."
Kashkari particularly challenged the idea of utilizing stablecoins for remittance purposes, emphasizing that this application primarily benefits individuals outside the United States, while disputing claims that the process is as cost-effective as proponents suggest.
He referenced his father-in-law, who resides in the Philippines, contending that although he could receive stablecoins rapidly, he would still be required to pay conversion fees to exchange them into the local currency before being able to use them for transactions.
"If everybody in the world uses the same currency or the same payment platform. All these frictions go away. But all these other countries are not going to abandon their own monetary policy [for stablecoins]," he said.
"When it comes to anything about crypto or stablecoins, ask the most basic questions and don't settle for word salad nonsense answers," he said.