Marc van der Chijs, a prominent entrepreneur and venture capitalist who helped shape the early landscape of the digital asset industry as a co-founder of the bitcoin mining giant Hut 8, is sounding a stark alarm regarding the very technology his former company has pivoted toward: artificial intelligence. In a recent shift that reflects a growing unease among tech insiders, van der Chijs expressed deep concerns that the rapid, unchecked advancement of AI could lead to catastrophic failures in global financial systems and critical physical infrastructure.
The Dutch-born investor, who famously entered the bitcoin market in 2013 and has spent the last decade championing decentralized technologies, admits that his outlook on the future of AI has darkened considerably in a very short span of time. While he continues to recognize the transformative economic power of the technology, he is increasingly skeptical about humanity’s ability to govern the "intelligence explosion" currently underway.
“I’ve become more of a doomer over the past week, to be honest,” van der Chijs said in an interview with CoinDesk. The term "doomer," once reserved for fringe internet subcultures, has increasingly been adopted by Silicon Valley veterans who believe that the trajectory of artificial intelligence may pose existential or systemic risks if not managed with extreme caution.
For van der Chijs, this realization marks a significant departure from his previous stance. He once viewed AI’s potential through the same optimistic lens he applied to bitcoin a decade ago—as a tool for liberation and efficiency. Now, however, he questions whether the window for safe implementation has already closed. “We have lost control, actually,” he stated. “And until we get the control back, I’m actually worried that we’re moving too fast.”
The Speed of Innovation vs. Human Oversight
The shift in van der Chijs’s perspective mirrors a broader movement within the tech industry. His warnings align closely with those of Dario Amodei, the CEO of Anthropic, who has been a vocal advocate for slowing the pace of "frontier" AI development. Amodei and other safety-conscious leaders have cautioned that the industry is locked in a dangerous feedback loop: as AI models become more capable, they are increasingly used to design and improve the next generation of AI, leading to recursive self-improvement that happens at speeds far beyond human comprehension or regulatory oversight.
This "structural trap" is exacerbated by the competitive pressures of the global market. Companies like OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic, along with rival nation-states, are locked in an intense race where any individual actor who chooses to slow down for safety reasons risks being left behind and losing market dominance. This "race to the bottom" on safety protocols makes systemic disruption or even catastrophic failure seem almost inevitable before international guardrails can be established and enforced.
Van der Chijs believes that the world may be heading toward a "Sputnik moment"—a major, visible crisis that serves as a wake-up call for global powers. He fears that a significant disruption, potentially one that cripples a major financial system or brings down critical infrastructure, might be the only catalyst strong enough to force governments into genuine, high-level cooperation.
