Dave Portnoy Explains Why He Used His Consensus 2025 Debut to Train the Spotlight on XRP

The outspoken founder of Barstool Sports, used his debut appearance at CoinDesk's Consensus 2025 to train the conference spotlight on XRP.

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Dave Portnoy, the outspoken founder of Barstool Sports, used his debut appearance at CoinDesk’s Consensus to train the conference spotlight on XRP.

Speaking on the Metro Toronto Convention Centre mainstage, Portnoy acknowledged that he bought the token for one reason only: fear of missing out.

Joined on-stage by media strategist Sam Ewan, Portnoy opened with light banter about Toronto pizza—'North of Brooklyn still is, I would say, my favorite,' he insisted, giving 'shout-out Bill the Greek, who's like my chaperone for Toronto'—before turning to the market that drew thousands to Consensus.

Pressed on whether the current cycle is dominated by so-called meme coins, Portnoy cut to the chase.

'Even Bitcoin is, frankly, a memecoin,' said Portnoy, setting the tone for a discussion that ping-ponged between portfolio confessions and cultural critique.

When Ewan tried to pinpoint Portnoy's boldest wager, the 47-year-old rattled off winners the way others recall birthdays: Axon stock at roughly $200 (now about $700, he noted), Michigan's Rose Bowl triumph, and Scottie Scheffler capturing the Masters.

Yet he called those victories 'two different things' from the instant, couch-bound gratification of watching a line of green candles.

'There's something about it when you place a bet, you see Bitcoin go up, you see XRP go up, and you're just sitting on your couch—'I made that money not working.' That's a great feeling,' he admitted.

Portnoy's self-diagnosed FOMO emerged in sharper relief as the conversation turned to real estate. He recalled smashing his fist on a desk after being outbid on a Miami apartment by 'a crypto bro' who 'heard about Bitcoin when it was, I don't know, eight bucks, seven bucks.'

The episode, he said, crystallised the anxiety of missing an asymmetric trade: 'I've slaved for twenty years and he just out-bid me.'

That same impulse, Portnoy confessed, now drives his position in XRP.

'It's what—two bucks forty cents or something like that? What if that's the next Bitcoin?' said Portnoy, stressing that his allocation is fueled by a speculative itch rather than a thesis about Ripple's technology or tokenomics. 'It's FOMO. It's not like I have some grand belief in it.'

In perhaps the panel's most revealing anecdote, Portnoy recounted his chance encounter with the Winklevoss twins at a hotel. The twins, famous for co-founding Facebook with Mark Zuckerberg, stayed next door to Portnoy and invited him to breakfast to discuss Bitcoin.

At the time, Portnoy had a tidy sum of $10 million in his bank account and decided to allocate a portion to the cryptocurrency. However, despite the twins' attempts to explain the technology behind Bitcoin, Portnoy found himself completely indifferent.

Instead, he was focused on their upbeat predictions for the token's price. As the twins spoke, Portnoy kept thinking to himself, "It’s going to go up?"

Finally, the twins' enthusiasm proved contagious, and Portnoy decided to invest a significant portion of his earnings in Bitcoin. However, in a sudden shift of heart, Portnoy sold off all his Bitcoin holdings right there in the hotel room.

The forfeited position—'about $2 million'—would have dwarfed every other win in his career, he said, highlighting the emotional swing between conviction and capitulation that defines many retail journeys through crypto's boom-and-bust cycles.

At press time, XRP is trading at $2.40.