The Flying Frisby - money, markets and more The Dollar's Demise Is No Longer A Conspiracy Theory
I am travelling to the bitcoin conference in Prague this week - come say hi if you’re there - so you are likely to get a lot of bitcoin-related content over the next fortnight, as I re-indoctrinate myself.
Indeed, we are talking bitcoin and gold today — and we start with this.
The Bitcoin Treasury Boom
UK-listed Coinsilium (AQUIS:COIN), as flagged last Sunday, is jumping on the bitcoin treasury bandwagon. It has risen over 600% in the 10 days since I covered it. It was 6p. Now it's over 40p.
Its market cap it £135 million. It only owns 25 bitcoins. (Worth around £2 million).
Nuts. But there you go.
I have taken my original stake off the table. I’ll let the rest run, as I think it will. Its recently announced placement was four times oversubscribed.
Bitcoin treasury companies are the new sh1tcoins. There will soon be more of them than there are sh1tcoins, the way things are going. It will probably all end in tears - for which we will have the FCA to thank, because it has outlawed investors from buying bitcoin ETFs and the like - but, while the music is playing, we dance.
The other possibility, of course, is that productive companies follow the zombie company lead, at which point the entire corporate financial model changes. Every company becoms a bitcoin treasury company. I actually think there’s a good chance of this happening, and I’ll explain why in a moment.
But let me just remind you — and myself — that owning a bitcoin treasury company is not the same as owning bitcoin. It’s a speculation, a substitute, but it’s not the same.
(BTW I bought some bitcoin with Revolut the other day, and I found the process very simple - though I quickly sent the money to another, safer wallet. Strike and CoinCorner are other UK options.)
The non-US bitcoin treasury plays are doing better than the US, which is interesting. Strategy (NASDAQ:MSTR) and Semler (NASDAQ:SMLR), for example, are not moving. (They will if bitcoin breaks to new highs above $110,000, as it is trying to do, but for now it’s all about the UK and Japan, and the dumb regulations that have created this situation).
Gold Is Now Number Two
This week has seen something of a landmark development, meanwhile. Gold has overtaken the euro to become the second-most held asset by central banks. 20% of central bank reserves are now held in gold, against 16% in euros.
Also of considerable note — and largely unreported — US dollar holdings have fallen below 50% for the first time in almost 30 years. They now sit at 46%.
De-dollarisation is happening, folks, right in front of our eyes.
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This 20% gold figure compares with just 10% ten years ago. I’ve little doubt this will double again over the next 10 years - and we’ll be at 40%.
Even ECB Chief Lizard, Christine Lagarde, has noticed. “The accumulation of gold by central banks continued at a record pace,” she says. “Some countries have been actively exploring alternatives to traditional cross-border payment systems.”
That last sentence is telling. It further confirms what we all knew was happening. It’s not just as a store of value that the US dollar’s central role is subsiding, but as a medium of exchange.
Gold is reclaiming its historical role as a core international holding. Make sure you own some.
If you are buying gold or silver to protect yourself in these ‘interesting’ times, the dealer I use and recommend is the Pure Gold Company. Pricing is competitive, quality of service is high. They deliver to the UK, the US, Canada and Europe or you can store your gold with them. Find out more here.
In the same press release Lagarde says:
“Offering solutions for settling wholesale financial transactions recorded on distributed ledger technology platforms in central bank money will increase the efficiency of European financial markets and the global appeal of the euro.”
That’s reptilian speak for “the euro CBDC is coming soon”. The EU CBDC Beast could begin as soon as this year. It will be rolled out first at the institutional level. Then it will be forced on the minions (which I don’t think will work, by the way, for reasons explained [here] — but that doesn’t mean they won’t try).
Turning to what might prove the Big Kahuna.
The Real Crisis: Government Spending Can’t Stop
We have another rapidly developing plotline, and this announcement was widely overlooked by the press - probably on government orders, but perhaps because, as Occam’s Razor would have it, they’re thick.
It is, in my view, a highly significant development, and is going to open the door to a ton of money-printing.