Paul Vigna

Vigna wrote and edited the MarketTalk column for Dow Jones Newswires. As of January 2015 he was a markets reporter for The Wall Street Journal covering equities and the economy, a columnist and anchor for MoneyBeat, and co-author with Michael J. Casey of the daily BitBeat.⁠[1]

He spent about 25 years as a reporter and editor at Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal, where he pioneered coverage of the cryptocurrency sector, and has appeared on outlets including CNNCNNCNN (Cable News Network) is an Atlanta-based news organization founded by Ted Turner on June 1, 1980, as the world’s first 24-hour television news channel. It has been owned in turn by Turner Broadcasting System, Time Warner, AT&T and Warner Bros. Discovery, became part of Skydance Corporation along with Warner Bros. Discovery in October 2026, and is one of the five networks that rotate in the White House television pool.Open the full entry, CNBCCNBCCNBC is an American business and financial news cable channel launched by NBC in 1989; it merged with its rival FNN in 1991 and since January 2026 has been part of Versant Media Group, spun off from Comcast.Open the full entry, MSNBCMS NOWMS NOW (My Source for News, Opinion and the World) is an American cable channel for political news and commentary. It was formerly MSNBC, launched in July 1996 as a joint venture of NBC and Microsoft, adopted its current name on November 15, 2025, as its business was spun off from Comcast, and since January 2026 has belonged to the independent public company Versant Media Group. It is known for its liberal-leaning commentary programs.Open the full entry, Fox and PBS.⁠[2]

In April 2015 Andreessen HorowitzAndreessen HorowitzAndreessen Horowitz (a16z) is a venture capital firm founded in 2009 by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. It invests from the seed stage through the growth stage and provides operational support to its portfolio companies.Open the full entry released the a16z Podcast episode “a16z Podcast: The Five Stages of Bitcoin — Disdain, Dismissal, Curiosity, Oh F**k!, and Acceptance,” featuring Michael J. Casey and Vigna, co-authors of The Age of Cryptocurrency and writers for The Wall Street Journal.⁠[3]

The episode discussed how far bitcoin had spread into Wall Street’s thinking and the wider global economy; the two described five stages of moving from skepticism to fascination and argued that, after the financial crisis, “the bitcoin blockchain could be a tool to help rebuild trust” in currency and institutions. The episode was uploaded to the a16z YouTubeYouTubeYouTube is Google’s video-sharing and creator platform, founded in 2005 by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim and acquired by Google in 2006. Built around video uploading, viewing, and creator earnings, the platform has developed Shorts, YouTube Music, Premium, YouTube TV, and products for children, and is headquartered in San Bruno, California, United States.Open the full entry channel on January 1, 2019, as “a16z Podcast | The Five Stages of Bitcoin -- Disdain, Dismissal, Curiosity, Oh F**k!, and Acceptance.”⁠[3][4]

The Age of Cryptocurrency: How Bitcoin and Digital Money Are Challenging the Global Economic Order, which Vigna co-wrote with Michael J. Casey, was published by St. Martin's Press in 304 pages; it covers the history of money and the broader ideas behind BitcoinBitcoinBitcoin (common symbol BTC) is an open peer-to-peer electronic cash protocol, network, and native digital asset. Full nodes independently verify transactions and blocks according to the consensus rules; transactions are recorded as UTXOs, and blocks are organized into a public ledger through proof of work. Bitcoin is not issued or managed by any single institution, but using, holding in custody, and trading it still involve key, privacy, market, and legal risks.Open the full entry, such as tamper-proof records.⁠[5]

His other books include The Truth Machine, as a coauthor, and Guts: The Anatomy of The Walking Dead.⁠[2]