PANews reported on October 24 that according to Cointelegraph, MicroStrategy founder Michael Saylor changed his position on self-custody after a strong backlash caused by his advocacy that Bitcoin should be custodied by "big banks." Saylor said in a statement on October 23 that he supports "willing and capable users to conduct self-custody" and emphasized the right to self-custody and the freedom to choose the form of custody.
Saylor mentioned in an interview that Bitcoin holders should trust banks that are "too big to fail", which triggered criticism from many industry insiders, including Vitalik Buterin. Dash marketer Joel Valenzuela called it "capitulation", while Max Keiser criticized Saylor for favoring the traditional centralized banking system, calling it "regressive".
In addition, Ledger CEO Pascal Gauthier pointed out in response that "there is no cryptocurrency without self-custody," emphasizing the importance of self-custody, but he also reminded that self-custody is not risk-free, as demonstrated by Ledger's user data leak in 2020.
