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What you're telling me is that music is about to stop and we're going to be left holding the biggest bag of odorous extra ever assembled in the history of darkness. 1974198792972000 and whatever we want to call this, it's all just the same thing over and over. We can't help ourselves. I say when we. Sell. Hey, I say when we sell. Thank you for joining us for this week's episode of The Last Trade, a podcast from On Ramp Media. On today's show, we're joined by Mark Valik, fund manager and partner at Incrementum, an independent asset management company based in Liechtenstein. Incrementum has established themselves as thought leaders in the realm of hard assets, offering various investment funds comprised of gold, precious metals and Bitcoin. Mark discusses his journey to discovering and becoming passionate about sound money. He explains how the existing Fiat monetary system is not sustainable and why he appreciates Austrian economics. Mark also talks about the challenges of starting a fund that combines gold and Bitcoin, and the advantages of blending these two assets in a portfolio. He discusses the current state of the market, the geopolitical backdrop, and the changing dynamics of gold pricing. The conversation explores the importance of counterparty risk, the potential for a banking liquidity crisis, and the role of gold and Bitcoin as hedges against these risks. It delves into the geopolitical tensions and retaliations between nations, as well as the increasing number of problem banks and unrealized losses in the banking sector. The discussion highlights the importance of understanding the challenges of a debt based financial system, the idea that gold and Bitcoin can provide a hedge against counterparty risk and inflation, and the importance of educating individuals about these assets. Now time for the show. There's only three of us. There's going to be four of us. There's only three. The show must go on. You're joined by Mark Valik of Incrementum and the In Gold We Trust Report. Mark, thank you for joining us. Welcome to the show. Thanks for having me and Mark. I know Michael and I are really excited to have you on today because I think the position in which you sit in the firm in which you've built over the last 11 years is really unique in terms of its focused on sound money, but particularly a blend of gold and Bitcoin specifically. So I think the start, start off the conversation, which is learn about yourself, your journey to discovering sound money and why you're so passionate about it and how that rolled into Incrementum, starting that fund and managing that over the last 11 years. OK, well I'm native Austrian and that's why I hope you can cope with my Austrian accent. But it's not that. I found Austrian economics in the Austrian university system, but actually only post graduate when I already was fund managed in 2000s roughly shortly before the GFC actually hit. And, and when it then hit, I really fell into that rabbit hole. And what, what amazed me back then was that basically nobody from traditional finance really looked at the financial system critically in the monetary system. So that's one thing I, I, I really wanted to investigate how, how this actually worked. And then with all the QE which came, came up back then in 2008, 2009 and so on, that was really weird. And I think a lot of people actually from the financial sector really didn't know what was going on. But then things seemed to settle down and then things went on. But I didn't buy that. And I, I, I really came to the conclusion that the monetary system was not sustainable. And then I found out about gold. I found out about Austrian economics, which is really, I think interdisciplinary. So you, you, you actually fall fall into the rabbit hole of, of monetary history and I mean in, in, in, in Europe and Austria, Germany, we, we had this hyperinflations 100 years ago. So, so there is some remnants there. Which one already knows from, from, from Peps family stories from from your grandparents and so on. And, and if you, if, if you actually dig into, into all these kind of topics, you, you really find out about this, this, this repeating Fiat scam, I'd call it, which, which, which has been ongoing for, for for several 100 years probably. And, and, and I really thought this is, is, is not the way to how, how things probably should, should, should be at the end of the day, because it's not moral. It's not ethically this monetary system with all the transfer of wealth, which is going on through creation of money. And, and, and on the other hand, I also saw, saw an investment opportunity because my previous job first was fund analysis. I was interviewing hedge fund managers and when I found out about Austrian economics, I started to, to interview these people if, if, if they had heard of it. And most of them said, yes, they know about it, but really they did not. And and then I thought, OK, if there must be some kind of an edge to it. And we started to come up with investment products which basically take into account this unsustainability of, of the monetary system. And that's, that's really why we wanted to, to found our own boutique, which which really I think has a different view on, on the world of monetary system economics and the likes. So that's my little journey in a nutshell I guess. At On Ramp, we believe that Bitcoin will be the most important asset to own in the 21st century. Our Multi Institution custody solution is the safest and most secure way to ensure that your Bitcoin remains in your and your family's possession for decades to come. Multi Institution custody maximizes security and minimizes counterparty risk, leveraging Bitcoin's native properties to eliminate single points of failure that have historically complicated Bitcoin ownership. On Ramp provides Peace of Mind for your Bitcoin journey. For more information, check us out at on rampbitcoin.com. I think it's a similar journey that a lot of us have gone through and welcoming Mark to the show, got through the difficulties there and I so post financial crisis, 2008, 2009, you went through this, this period of really trying to figure out why the financial system was rotten at its core. I think we all agree like we've we've completely broken money as a tool, we cannot price things accurately. And so in terms of recognizing that inefficiency in the market or the corruption in the market and then starting a fund around it in 2013 when you started Incrementum, what is what was the core thesis back then? Has it changed at all? And what is what is your pitch to clients essentially in terms of parking money with Incrementum too deploy in a way that is counter to most traditional asset managers? Well, my first entrepreneurial experience was basically already next to my job as a fund manager with a bullion dealership, which which I Co founded. That was 2011. And also around that time, I think 2012, we we also bought some, some Bitcoin privately, but that was a small allocation back then, which became bigger in, in terms of asset allocation. But, but, but we really are knew that in 2013 we wouldn't be able to integrate this in into a regulated fund because our business is fund management. And 2013 was way too early to, to think about that. But we, we kept on looking at the developments in, in, in the Bitcoin scene and the crypto scene and tried to, to push also to, to start regulated funds with, with Bitcoin exposure. And as we founded our company in, in Liechtenstein, which then happened to be pretty open regarding crypto that that was turned out to be an advantage. But still, it took years and years until we really were able to pull it off. So at the end of the day, our, our first regulated fund, which is combining gold and, and Bitcoin was launched in, in early 2020. So that was quite a journey actually until we were able to, to, to, to start that fund. But next to that fund our, our other, our other strategies are basically resources. So we we have a fund which which has uranium exposure, it's uranium equity funds, we have inflation diversification funds and we have a balanced portfolio all seasons funds. So we've got actually different strategies. And since 2020, we have two strategies which combine precious metals and, and Bitcoin exposure. And that's, that's actually what we do. And, and, and I think the combination of, of, of real assets in terms of commodities and, and, and gold and, and Bitcoin monetary assets, that's, that's I think something which one should be overweight in, in the next years. And that's at least how how we personally invest and that's what we also offer for our clients. Mark taking a a step back on one notice. So your your Co founders who we've spoken with they Ronnie yesterday put out he had retweeted from Crescent cap. They put out the rise of hard assets and it's a we'll we'll attach to it in the show notes, but it's effectively breaking down a research report. And he the quote is to put it plainly, today's Michael Lewis big short opportunity in our view is the ongoing devaluation of Fiat currencies relative to real assets with limited supply, which are imperative to society either as commodities or sound money. And this is, you know, whatever June 2024, you guys coming around this idea in 2013 and coalescing with four Co founders. I'm curious, was everybody, although I would imagine everybody was a sound money advocate and understood why gold was money, Did everybody come at it together about Bitcoin as well or was there a learning progress to get to that 2020 point where you blended in Bitcoin and gold into one of the fun strategies? I mean, the nice thing about our partnership is we, we, we are five partners and we all run our strategies. So we, we, if we are convinced and we want to start a new strategy and we can fund it, we can do it. So I mean, yes, we need the consense of consensus of all the partners. But, but basically that's, that's not a big issue because we, we think relatively alike. I mean, everybody has his own opinions, but but that that that wasn't the issue. The the, the, the more, the, the bigger challenge was basically finding investors not too much because to to convince the investors, but but but due to this new regulatory issue and and then also crypto coming into into place. So, so the, the, the, the, the term crypto was like really still is actually difficult for for banks, but, but especially in 2018-2019, they, they were really, everybody sounded the alarm bells when, when, when, when they realized, OK, this, this fund has crypto exposure and this is the evil thing and money laundering and so on. So you really had to basically over overcome a lot of regulatory obstacles and, and, and talk with compliance officers and, and, and even and if you had the investors which which we did bringing like having having actually the funds coming in into the fund at the time we wanted to start the fund that that that really was was quite troublesome, but we pulled it off. And then just like two weeks after that, Bitcoin started crashing in one week after that, actually we started the fund, I think in, in February 24, 2020. And in the beginning of March, everything crashed, which turned out to be a big opportunity because, I mean, we, we bought, we bought into, into the crash and we, we stuck to our strategy, which was 25% Bitcoin, 75% gold. And, and we really, we're, we're actually averaging in, in, in into low prices. So, so we really actually could, could capture most of the upside because the market turned pretty fast in, I don't know, mid, mid March, I think already. So, so that were quite interesting weeks for us. But, but we started off pretty well and, and now things are up and running. And I think we, we also obviously had the first bear market in 2022. And, and, and the concept of, of, of combining precious metals with, with, with Bitcoin again paid, paid off in terms of volatility. Because I think a lot of people then started investing in 2021 and then then lost their nerves in 2022 because they were just like not used to this high volatility. And I think that's really a big challenge for traditional investors. And that's, I think also one of the main advantages to, to offer a product which is, which is more which is in a volatility range, which traditional investors are used to. It's like equity kind of volatility and, and, and they're used to these kind of draw downs and they can stomach these kind of draw downs and, and they did. So all our investors basically stick to us and they are, I guess pretty happy at this point again. And I guess that brings up a good plan. I mean, we can get into the overarching macro thesis, particularly as it pertains to everything going on geopolitically and from a monetary aspect today. But I think since we're touching on it now, talking about the blended portfolio of gold and Bitcoin, obviously over its first 15 years, Bitcoin, a lot of the headlines around it are are due to the price volatility and pairing that with gold, which is more stable from a price volatility perspective over time, just due to the fact that it's been around for millennia. What what is pairing these two assets from a volatility perspective do for for a portfolio? Yeah. That's, that's been a point where I perhaps, or my personal opinion is a little bit different to, let's say, the opinion which you typically hear within the Bitcoin space, which is I think when it comes to volatility, people expect Bitcoins volatility to to go down proportionally to to the market cap. I've been hearing this for many years actually. And you can make the argument that this did happen in the first years, but I think it, it, it, it didn't happen actually in the last five years, especially if you look at the, at the draw downs, that last two draw downs during the last two bear markets were pretty much the similar range, I think roughly -77% or so last bear market and, and, and the one before that one perhaps slightly higher, but, but, but pretty pretty much in, in, in this range and, and this with a much higher market cap. So, so this thesis I think is, is not playing out the volatility perhaps in terms of standard deviation has come down. But but, but the Max Rodon, which is really, I think the, the, the better parameter to to watch has not and I don't expect it to to come down much in future also. And obviously the upside was much higher than gold. That's that's also true. So risk adjusted, it's still a great asset, don't get me wrong, but but I think it will always have the challenge of being a high volatility asset. And, and, and as I said, this is a challenge for for a lot of investors just due to perhaps their age or to, due to their risk appetite, right. And if, if, if you can manage this high volatility within with position sizing with within the portfolio, that's actually basic portfolio management, just size your position accordingly. But but that's in practice easier said than done because with this high volatility come high emotions at the behavioral finance traps which come with Bitcoin I think are extremely high. So I think not many people really have managed the risk in a good way, even though, as I said, theoretically it's, it's, it's not a, a very difficult task to do. But in practice, for instance, I mean, we, we, we always preach to rebalance the portfolio and, and, and we do it in our strategies. And I also tell people to, to, to do it by themselves. But, but in practice, who, who really rebalanced? I don't know in November 2022 when everything was like full of FTX bankruptcies and the media was all like Bitcoin is dying. Yeah, hardcore Bitcoin has probably took advantage of of of of this opportunity. But but like the the more the people who are newer in in into that game probably did not they did the opposite, I would guess right. So, so, so that is a challenge and, and coming back to what I was going to say, I, I don't think that Bitcoin's volatility will will go down significantly because the one advantage which it has over gold, namely it is not a physical asset, is a disadvantage when it comes to volatility. It's exactly the physical physicality and, and also the the physical properties as a as an industrial metal which which actually counterbalance the volatility. Because if you have high monetary demand of of gold, basically the industrial use cases will be substituted, right. So you will will have lesser demand from from from industry side and you will have higher supply also from the scrap gold side. And this always is like counter cyclical in terms of volatility. And I think this disadvantage. Or advantage doesn't necessarily have to be an advantage, but this difference obviously always will, will, will stay so, so I, I don't think that Bitcoin's volatility will, will ever reach gold's volatility as long as we are in a Fiat standard. If we switch to a Bitcoin standard, then then it's the unit of the count and the volatility could actually be zero as it was in the case of gold until 1971, right? So but, but I, I think we, we will have to wait a while to to get there, I'm afraid. Yeah, I think the natural notion of a finite fixed supply with infinite amount of liquidity in pools obviously keeps that volatility moving and and reducing over time. But to your point, it's still insanely volatile. This notion of the blend is something I've been thinking about for over a year. And So what I found incrementing, I thought it was incredible to see. Mark, have you seen a blend of Bitcoin and gold together in a fun strategy? And then also, how do you think about it from an idea of getting somebody interested in the asset class? Because I think that's the big thing that we forget. And this is something that I think Larry Laparde helped me understand is like from an age perspective, some people just shouldn't and don't need it. Not only do they not need to, but shouldn't have to suffer a 70% drawdown in their net worth. And so this reality of having some percentage allocated to Bitcoin, well, then you leave the rest to what are they going to hold? You know, again, we know equities, bonds, it's like, does it really make sense? Or where they hold another sound monetary instrument and then they can over time rebalance if it makes sense, whether it's via conviction or just the assets price. So I've always thought of this as a very interesting way to like actually start the conversation with somebody that would historically be away from Bitcoin that understands gold, because there's very few firms that do this. And that's almost a signal to the individual from a macro perspective and specialist perspective that if you can align something that's, you know, 5000 plus year track record along with something that's digital in nature, you're, you're sending the signal that this asset is closer to digital gold than effectively aluminum or, you know, not have value at IE crypto. So just curious, Mark, have you seen this in any thoughts on like how you would this could be introduced from a net new position to somebody? Yeah. I mean you mentioned Larry Leppart, like him a lot. He I think we we think a very in similar ways in in in this relation. Also Charlie Morris has has has a combined product. I don't know if you know him from by by three. So but these really are the only only guys I know who who actually offer combined strategies or I don't know if Larry actually offers a combined strategy, but who who really actually think that the combination makes sense. The Three Musketeers. I think it's a rare breed if you if you like gold and Bitcoin together, but also like big names like Ray Dalio, who I would consider probably the king of strategic asset allocation. He, he said, I think two or three years ago, I like my gold with sprinkles of Bitcoin on it, which I think is a really nice quote. And I thought it vindicated our thesis pretty pretty much. And, and it's not only him. I mean, if you, if you follow discussions in the, in the mainstream financial media, I, it seems to me at least gold and Bitcoin are mentioned more and more together. So I think this is a natural convergence which which is happening when, when you discuss about these topics and, and, and then I think also that, and we wrote about this I think in 2019 in our in gold Redrust report. We thought back then that this will be kind of going forward kind of perhaps a little bit similar to like, like like an equity bond portfolio. It would be like a building block of, of a traditional portfolio, gold Bitcoin building block, which you can basically add to, to your equity bond allocation, right? And I think there will be more and more managers who, who offer some kind of strategies like like these because, because it just makes sense in, in terms of risk, risk adjusted rewards. So probably there are more by now. I I know of us three and as I said, perhaps there are more managers by now. Yeah. And I think it's a good point to jump into the current state of the market and why gold and Bitcoin have had really good years over the last. I mean Bitcoin since the beginning of 2023 is up I think well over 150% at this point are around their. Gold obviously has been breaking out to the upside, hitting new all time highs. And when you juxtapose that to the geopolitical backdrop, you have the US government $34 trillion in debt, 220 plus trillion in unfunded liabilities. You have what many would say is somewhat of a political crisis here in the US as well as everything's become hyper partisan. Obviously, we have the Russia Ukraine war which led to the seizure of Russian treasury assets and we've had many conversations not we, but BRICS countries particularly have had many conversations about diversifying away from the dollar system due to the risk that has become apparent there from a custody perspective. And at the same time, you, you can see this in charts as well, particularly with China accelerating their their offloading of U.S. Treasuries at the same time that they're accelerating their buying of gold. And so in the terms of where we stand today in June 2024, Mark, would you consider this like a a massive inflection point that is somewhat anomalous over the last 50 years? Especially when it comes to gold, I think that's actually the biggest surprise. If you look at the I mean, Bitcoin still seems to be following this it's four year cycles. So I think that's basically more or less doing what we could have expected, right. But gold gold actually is now showing a a new playbook. And that's also the new light light motif of our new in gold. We trust report the new gold playbook And what we what do we mean by that? Because I mean, you did a good job of already pointing out a lot of arguments or explanations for for for gold's good performance recently. But if, if you look at the one, the most influential factor traditionally regarding the gold price that were real yields, the US dollar, right? So you have rising real yields, then typically you have falling gold price and vice versa. So if you have basically, I mean, the opportunity cost of holding gold is, is, is real yields basically, right? So that, that correlation worked pretty well for, for many years and, and that really got crushed in, in I'd say mid 2022. And one of the big reasons probably was the seizure of, of, of, of Russian assets assets. The sanctions mean the whole world was shown that Treasuries or European bonds for that matter are not the riskiest asset, contrary to what one has to I think still fill out in the CFA program. You have to say, OK, Treasury bonds is the riskiest asset, but it's not right if there is a counterparty risk related to to that asset. And, and I think central banks woke up to that reality and you saw you, you can see this in, in the statistics they have been wrapping up their, their gold purchases hugely. You had quarterly purchases of roughly sorry yearly purchases of roughly 250 tons during the last 1010 years and starting from 2022 you now have 1000 tons. So basically quadrupling of of the central bank purchasing and this is what you're now showing is basically this divergent of of the real rates relative to the gold price. So one could actually make the case, since real yields have risen, especially in the US and are positive also one could make the case quite a strong case that at least according to the old gold playbook, the gold price would actually have to sold off significantly. And the opposite happened. Yeah. And this is basically the new reality when it comes to gold purchases. The the the big advantage of gold is that it has no counterparty risk. And this is obviously hugely respected again, by by by central banks around the world. We do live in, in, in, in some really I I think serious times when it comes to geopolitics. We the the last light motif was showdown and we talked about the geopolitical showdown, which is obviously ongoing and, and started especially going was kicked into high gear in 2022. And yeah, this is this is 1 manifestation of, of the geopolitical showdown. Gold is being redistubbled as neutral reserve asset. And Logan, if you Scroll down one more slide to page 10. I think this is also really interesting chart and illuminating that people are favoring physical gold over ETF products specifically. I'm sure this is a product of central banks buying directly, But building on this point in this chart specifically, do you think there has been a an investor appetite to favor physical over paper exposure via something like an ETF due to, I mean, many people would say they're conspiracy theories, but I think they're pretty, pretty well documented at this point with gold price fixing in London and other bullion depositories. I believe in 2020 there was a problem with COMEX in the London exchange as well, the LME. Do you think people are demanding physical because they really want to hold the good thing and they don't trust the paper markets? And if so, could that demand for physical bullion corrupt what many believe to be price fixing that has been going on for decades? Yeah, that's, that's a big topic. There's a big question. I mean the the graph which you just which we just saw, perhaps you can just put it up once more. I think one has to think about who, who are we talking. I mean, this is a global market obviously for gold and the very different types of investors. And what we are seeing here is gold ETFs, right? And gold ETFs are usually used by financial investors who who don't really I think have these kind of fears mainly, you know. So I think that's really interesting that basically these investors are acting according to the old gold playbook. They think they, they, they see that bonds yield some, they have a, have a, have an interesting yield again. And, and therefore they sold off their, their, their gold holdings. And as I said, if, if, if the traditional playbook would have helped, probably the, the, the gold price would have fallen, right? But if you think about it, this as I said are Western, probably most of them are U.S. Financial investors and they rightly so, do not have to care so much about counterparty risks for now when it, when it comes to bonds, it's, it's probably mainly, I don't know, central banks from, from countries which, which perhaps are not so favorable to the US. And, and, and, and, and I think you could make the argument these financial investors are acting rational, right, Because they, I mean, 5 1/2 percent yield on, on the short term Treasury note. That's, that's, that's quite interesting if you have official evaluation rate of, I don't know, 333 percentage points or something like that, right. So you, you, you didn't get two 2 1/2 percent real yields for for decades, in fact, right. So, so gold isn't so interesting for Western investors, but it's much more interesting for for Eastern investors, if you will, or, or, or the global S if you want to call it that term. And, and this is also the the divergent. I think Western, Western investors haven't haven't really woken up to the fact that that perhaps counterparty risk also will at some point be imminent for, for them. And excuse me. And also on the inflation side, that's also one point which we point out it's the inflation expectations really are stable. I mean it really amazes me that that the, the, the, the mainstream financial investor from the West really thinks we are done with inflation. Everything is good now. That was really like only two, two year anomaly. But given the fact that we're so indebted and this trajectory is really only going to go up, especially with with the higher financing costs. I think if you look at history that suggests that we will have another inflation, inflationary waves coming sooner or later and then Western investors may change their mind pretty, pretty fast on their gold exposures. Yeah, it's it's so fascinating on like the regional differences and this notion of counterparty risk and who cares and who doesn't. Mark, I'd love to Mark Connors on your side. When you, we've talked about this before in your previous roles in Wall Street when it comes to pricing risk and explaining risk. Like how much of that is happening right now with the interest in Bitcoin or as it looked at as we've traditionally seen as like a high, you know, beta, like tech play and people are coming at it from a, you know, perspective that's completely different than this. And where have you seen those themes start to like converge? So you're, you're giving me a little bit of PTSD from being a a risk manager during O8 when you know, you, you kind of just put some information out about the changing, you know, yield structures or, you know, some of the failures in the like where the hard assets went soft at the banks as far as asset backed securities and what that would be. Michael, no one cares about counterparty risk. They really don't. And and I I say that knowing things can change, but it is a show me game. They really need to be showed the door. They need to be showed the risk. Everybody, all the major financial institutions have been instilled are incentivized to take the path of least resistance. So Lehman did it when it started to get hot. They didn't sell their assets. All they did was move down the yield curve, the term structure from wholesale, which is safe out one 2-3 years to overnight, which is cheaper in order to keep their game going. And then we know what happened when JP Morgan and others finally said we're not going to lend to you. So I don't think counterparty risk is there. I think in the last 10 or 15 minutes, what Mark was talking about, which is one of the biggest, you know, to continue the incentive structure topic that I talked about, incentivize for ease, not for preventing stepwise risk of counterparty failure. The global S where people are starved for stability, that's where Bitcoin and gold I I think are going to be there. The fact that we can still invest in the S&P and have a company like NVIDIA pop up from nowhere and to give us value. I mean, the S&P is, is a good thing and bad thing. It, it helps maintain buying power, you know, at like a 7 to 12% gain because it's a momentum fund. It's got who knows what the next name is going to be. As I said, no one saw NVIDIA coming, but here we are with our, you know, equity focused portfolios doing fine. I, I, I, I think that the regionalization of awareness will be #1 the second point I want to talk about, which is gap risk and counterparty risk is, I mean, again, Michael Tanguna, this is what you've been working on, on the, on the risk free curve or cap M pricing model. You know, what is the hurdle rate for risk? And Mark, you also touched on it. I mean, I think that gold chart you had really does speak to that and talking about counterparty risk, if we can show that's not really just a short term preference, but a step wise, you know, a sea change in people saying this is now my risk free rate and there's a reason why treasuries have a higher yield and gold is being bought even though real rates are high because the games changed. And you know, I'll stop there. But I agree and we're all here for a reason. We are uncomfortable with the current financial system and we think it's just starting to shift. And that gold treasuries chart may be one of the best windows onto that dynamic. Yeah. The the part that you referenced that we all know of is the counterparty risk doesn't matter until it does. And the situation we're in, we know, everyone knows it's been listening. This is we're there's a one way train where we're headed. So you have to be ahead of the counterparty risk. Most in the West aren't concerned about it, but like this is the key drivers like it's coming to that point. And that's why gold and Bitcoin have these properties that you can free yourself from counterparty risk or actually provide redundancies in it. And that's like the benefit of the Bitcoin side of like we're almost like the Canary in the coal mine. They're not your keys, not your coin and all these things. We've already seen the collapses of a quasi, you know, bank runs. And so they give you that kind of like, you know, strength or the, the, the they give you the, the fortitude to figure out what are the best practices. And so nobody cares, but they're they're going to have to. And I think that's the idea here is you can, if you can create the solutions that are seamless and also get ahead of it. I think is a big is a big thing. This reminds me of when we launched the trust and we allowed for in kind delivery and and individuals would reference like Sprott and Oz and some of these other ones that Mark probably is familiar with that allow for redemptions. But then the second comment was like, oh, nobody ever, nobody ever uses that. Or I'm the only one that uses it because and it's like, yeah, nobody uses it because, you know, in the West, you're not concerned about your bank going down. You're not concerned about counterparty risk. But again, as we know, there's too much debt, not enough dollars. Counterparty risk will rear Ted at a certain point. And you don't want to be left with your whole, you know, life savings sitting on the other side of that trade. Whether you've been buying Bitcoin for years or just getting started on your journey, our Multi Institution Custody solution is the safest and easiest way to custody your Bitcoin. 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And there's been two recent developments in those two different areas. I think we should definitely touch on, which is at the geopolitical international level, many people focus on what the US and Western nations did to Russia's treasury assets a couple of years ago. And it seems that I believe it was last month, there was retaliation on behalf of Russia saying, all right, you're going to freeze our treasury assets, We're going to freeze some Western bank assets that are held within the country. And they did that last month, but I think it flew under the radar. But to me, that signals an escalation in terms of counterparty risk at the global level in these monetary payment systems and banking systems that have been erected. And so it took a couple years for rush to retaliate and seize Western funds held within its borders, but it did that last month. And does that create a moment where it becomes more normalized to do these things? Does that accelerate all the themes that we're that we've been talking about for the last 45 minutes? And then on the micro level, the FDIC came out with the report, quarterly report on the state of the banking sector and the number of banks, quote, UN quote problem banks as defined by the FDIC increased by 20%, but the amount of assets held by the quote UN quote problem banks increased 5.2 X. So I believe $180 billion. And then the FDIC also announced that there is over $500 billion in unrealized losses sitting on these bank balance sheets in the US, predominantly driven by commercial real estate and residential real estate. And so is there, Mark Valika, a scenario developing where counterparty risk is going to be at the fore because of of two things, the ratcheting up of the back and forth at the geopolitical level and then also another banking liquidity crisis potentially on the horizon? Yeah. I mean, we talked about the geopolitical tangent a little bit already and it's ongoing and probably will, I don't know, hopefully not, but seems to be escalating or at least doesn't seem to be de escalating, unfortunately. But I think it, it, it makes sense to step back for, for, for a second, because I mean, when we talk about counterparty risk, what, what are we talking about systemically? And I mean, we, we wrote a book Austrian School for investors in investing between inflation and deflation. And we thought about this title obviously. And this investing between inflation and deflation is I think brought along because we are in a debt, we have debt based financial system and not many people are talking about that fact because this discussion with between between deflationists and inflationists has been ongoing since decades. And, and I think both have a point, right. Because I mean when we talk about counterparty risk in an extreme case, we are talking about debt deflation or hyper deflation. And theoretically that can happen in a debt based system that's basically always looming over us. We talked about the financial crisis, the crisis 2008. That would have been huge debt deflation if, if, if central banks wouldn't have done what what they did. I mean, I wasn't a fan of that, but I, I, I, I can understand systemically, I can understand why they did it exactly to prevent this debt deflation. So, so this is always basically systemically a possibility. And I think it both extremes get more, more and more likely. I mean, this balance is more and more difficult to, to be been achieved. So to one extent, or perhaps even has to salute central banks how they've been able to, to manage it so, so, so long. But if, if, if we really get to, to, to, to, to a point where where the central bank would theoretically print too slow or react too slowly, then then this is a real, I think this is a real, a real threat, right? But in practice, we have this unpacked Fiat monetary system. And I think all, I mean, 2008 and 2020 basically already showed the way forward. We, we will never, I, I think it was very unlikely that we, that they print too slowly, right? Because I mean, I don't know how many billions, trillions did they print in, in, in 2020? I think 567 within a few, few months. It was really crazy amounts of, of currency which they created and, and they, they had the reason to do so, right, to prevent this debt deflation. And I think this will be at the end of the day, always the, the route that the way out because it's the the easy way out. But, but on, on a short term basis, we, we, we, we could see some kind of debt deflation or counterparty risk or and, and, and this is, this is and, and now coming back to gold and Bitcoin, that's, I think the beauty of these assets. They, they basically as long, especially if you, if you have the premise that Bitcoin also has no counterparty risk, which I think one can make the argument, but definitely with gold, I think that's very clear. You, you are hedged in in both of these extreme cases, right? And and I think this is important to understand and I think this is also another big argument in favour of these these two assets for for either of these extreme scenarios. Yeah, that's a, that's a great point in the sense of like you have counterparty risk on both sides of the curve on the short term, if you're just counterparty just goes to zero. And then on the long curve, because of the erosion of your purchasing power, if you're not holding gold or Bitcoin effectively right? Right. And that's the beauty of these assets. They are without the counterparty risk and they basically are not inflatable. So gold's being inflated, but they're at a very, very low rate. So with with 1 1/2% per per annum and and that's why I think that these are increasingly important supplements for your portfolio. Mark Connors, one of the question for you on the going back to the educating, you know, we do a lot of this on on this pod is for individuals that are into Bitcoin to go to their family, friends, colleagues, peers. Connor's on your side. How do you feel about that notion of whether it's a blend or being able to start with somebody that's into gold and talk about a strategy that has this blend there? It seems like there's something there that hasn't really been done that could really accelerate the learning curve for a lot of individuals. Yeah, it's almost like, well, look at what we have the ETF. So people say I know that animal and it's you know today I think is the second largest inflows after almost a little over four months of having the ETF. So that's an example Michael of just give them what they know. Folks my age and I think younger aren't as much into gold. They're getting, they're getting a little bit more awareness mark. So maybe you'll be getting you're getting more calls that way from, you know, people in their in their 40s and 50s who may be having a longer view of things or aware that things don't last forever, I should say. So I think goal, I'll start with the general portfolio and then I'll touch on how Bitcoin can be presented to a person already aware of goals, qualities from counterparting and inflation into basement. And I think it's about loss. So I, I just had a friend over the weekend, we were chatting and he said, I'm in, you know, I want to make an investment. How should I do it? And he said, Mark, listen, we're good. If it goes to 0, like, you know, he's like, we're, we're good. I'm just going to put a little bit in and, and I mention that because people are not familiar with it. So they are going to go worst case and they're going to be investing a small amount and they're they're either it's you, me or other people, Michael, I know Marty's been doing this forever who get people to the starting line and ready to, you know, to to jump on the gun when the gun sounds for them to buy it. I, when we get into that line, they're only going to want enough where it doesn't cause a divorce or pain or other disruption in their life because they can't really price the reason we're talking about. So since you can't price, it's hard. All models have that that default risk. It's it's that's like to solve for. It's always the hardest part of the model. There's not enough data. So instead trying to price that difficult thing that even modelers can't do in finance, they simply say there's something here. I really can't get my head around it. I want to start with enough that I can lose not ideal approach, but it's practical and that's why I think everybody gets to that 3% allocation on, even though we don't like the 6040 on the 6040 because I've shown in our work and other people have that a 3% rebalanced allocation of Bitcoin. And again, sorry for the 6040, but that's what we know back to what people are familiar with it does it barely changes the worst drawdown in any five year period. It's like 20 point 21.4% versus 20.8 for the standard 6040 because it does dovetail, because it isn't correlated because you're rebalancing. So that to me is it get them in with, you know, the you know, what do you want to call it the sugar wrapped approach and then let them feel it and go on from there. So that's what I what I think. I think it's hard to sell the insurance wrap. Some people like it. Most people feel uneasy. They're feeling the unsoundness, they're feeling that they're missing out. And if you given enough approach, like we got four people here who have, you know, some time, not that we're long in the tooth, but hopefully we're long on knowledge in the space. And if we're spend time talking about it, I think we're getting attention. So that's what I think. I think, yeah, sales, you got to minimize the downside through traditional viewpoints of what we call a tear sheet, the statistics anyway. And Mark, I don't know what your thoughts are. I'd love to hear how people are approaching that mixed portfolio that you're talking about. Yeah, it's, it's very different. I mean it's very different depending to whom you talk, obviously, right. I mean perhaps general thought regarding gold and Bitcoin. I mean, I personally, I, I go to to, to, to events like traditional fund events, traditional finance event, if you will. I, I go to gold events and I go to Bitcoin events and I really enjoy the Bitcoin events most. Why is that? Because there is some kind of positivity and some kind of constructive vibe there, right? The gold events mostly, I think the, the vibe is, is is rather negative. Perhaps you, you could you, you have the fear, perhaps a little bit more there and, and, and, and, and perhaps you have, I don't know, the greed or perhaps the, the, the, the, the, the fantasy on, on the Bitcoin side, right? And then, then the traditional finance. That's, that's like a, a dinosaur which is dying. It's, it's really bad going there. But but in, in, in, in this kind of, I mean, so if, because you mentioned insurance, right? I mean, it's, I think it's, it's easier to to to sell like a positive vision, right then then a negative vision. If you, if you talk about insurance, you talk about some kind of things which, which which may go wrong and a lot of things which are going wrong unfortunately and could become even worse, right. But but, but still, I think people rather like to to, to think about positive things. So, so that a positive vision about Bitcoin, I think is, is really a strong, strong argument. Obviously, I mean, I know what you're, you're saying. It's, it's, it's, it's a very big topic and, and, and, and for, for beginners, talking about the Bitcoin standard and all the ramification of the ramifications of the current monetary system. That's, that's, that's, that's too much. You know, you can't, you can't start with that. I, I, I get that. But but but talking about like a positive vibe and and and changing, changing the system. I think this is this is a better sell than talking about the insurance and some all all the things that potentially could could go wrong. That's that's my feeling. It's it's kind of unfortunate like this how far we've come because I think like when we go back, we'll this will just be standard. You know, Marty talks about a lot about like going from a level of you own the asset free, a counterparty risk and you can start to move up the stack as you want to get comfortable. But it's like we talk about notion of counterparty risk and all these other concepts. It's just like optionality, right? Doesn't anybody want optionality or the ability to be free of, you know, the, you know, you think about like always joke around. We have, you know, these different products we offer, but anytime we have a conversation, if somebody's between Coinbase or 12 words on a piece of paper and any pick any device, it's always the 12 words and the device, unless it's somebody that's like 90 plus years old, simply because like they have the optionality, like they can take their assets. They can't wake up one day and their phone says, like, sorry, you're, you can't log in or, you know, anybody listening to this, try to go to Coinbase and move assets around. They don't make it easy if they let you take it off. And so this notion of like, how do we get back to, you know, having some kind of responsibility for just knowing who our counterparties are and thinking through them critically? Like that's how I think about it. It's less about what I've obviously been looking at this for a long time as everybody here. But that notion that we're this far out, we reference how much trillions have been printed where inflation is. It's probably closer to 20%, honestly. You go to the store, but we're still like, that's OK. You know, I wanna NVIDIA and that's my purchasing power. And, and the, the, the bar keeps moving, right? Because I think Marky referenced 9 to 12%, but I'm convinced like whatever the number of the SMP, we're still plus 5% in real terms from an inflation perspective, which leaves basically nothing out there other than probably Bitcoin and some gold hybrid, if that to like outpace inflation Where we're going because it's only accelerating is the thing that I don't think most people talk about. We talked to the pension this past week and we talked, I talked to one yesterday and they were talking about, well, we're good, we're funded. I was like, are you like in real terms or nominal terms? And he was like, oh, nobody brings that up. Like when they actually going to get their 60,000 or 80,000 lbs, is it really going to buy anything relative to what they thought they were when they started allocating? I mean, yeah. And just go, go ahead. Marco, sorry. Excuse me, no, I just wanted to say I think we also all probably especially US investors which typically have AUS equity bias when they invest, they they are very biased regarding the last 40 years. So, so, so the collective mindset has been very positive when it comes to equity investing. But, but there are scenarios where you actually have where you had I think 16 years from from 1966 to 1982 where you we didn't get anywhere with equities. And in real, in real terms, you actually lost a lot of money investing in equities during a stagflation. I, I, I, I wouldn't be so, so sure that like going forward, the equity, the, the SNP and the NASDAQ or what what have you is, is, is basically your perfect inflation hedge. I mean, that could go, that could go pretty turn, turn pretty sour once you have longer terms, longer time frame with higher interest rates, right? If you have a second inflationary wave, you saw, you saw 2022, I think that that could, that could come back again, right? So I wouldn't, I wouldn't, I think historically you had, you had stocks and gold, basically a combination of stocks and gold keeping your, your purchasing powers. And, and these two assets basically switched, each had their run a few decades, right? And and, and, and, and equities also. I mean, it's, it's, it's not a given that equities rise. I just wanted to throw that in. Well, it's actually the opposite, Productivity goes down and number of dollars created go up, which causes more dollars chasing few fewer goods from an equity. And think about how many companies are staying private now because of the restrictions of of being public. So the access to some of these companies that that maybe are highly productive are choosing, you know, to stay out of the public reporting realm. Because I mean, I think taxes, the income tax and property tax rate are always focused, but the number of taxes that are coming out and fees are, are the hidden taxes that are bedeviling homeowners sales, you know, individuals and companies alike. So you know, Marco, good, good point on equities historically because sure, I mean gold went up what 14 or 16 times in the 70s on high Vol. So you know, that's, I bring it up as a Bitcoin focused firm because that's what we're seeing higher Vol, you know, and then on the upside, and I think that is, as you said over 40 years, that's there's not institutional memory about how things had been or maybe not always are as we've seen in the last in the prior 40 years. That also brings up like the question of if there is a sub sector of allocators are being somewhat complacent and really just running the playbook the last 30 to 50 years and thinking that that's going to be the playbook. I think we believe that things are changing rapidly and people better wake up to that fact. But with that in mind, Mark, what what do you think the world looks like on the other side of of this transition to hard assets geopolitically from a monetary perspective? Do you think we are at the beginning stages of a massive disruption of how international commerce and banking actually operates? Yeah. I mean, the one thing I learned is you don't really don't know the future. And I mean, it's always interesting to, to speculate, but my gut feeling is Bitcoin will save us. But I also have the feeling that we like going through like a birth of a new system, if you, if you will, has a lot of pain. Birth is, is a lot of pain involved, unfortunately with, with, with the new life form. And, and I think we have to go through this. It's my, my, my honest feeling. I think like from AI think from a geopolitical standpoint, the most of the Western world hasn't really realized how fed up a lot of parts of the world are with, with, with the actions of the West during the last decades, I guess. And, and they haven't also really realized how, how, how serious the situation is actually. I, I, I think so, unfortunately, but hopefully humanity can, can keep the keep the stuff together and, and and and and avoid the worst. But when it comes to like the, the economic point of view when it comes to to debt, I mean that for me is, is, is, is really clear. We, we need some kind of a revaluation of for me the, the, the, the bigger question is, will this Fiat system be able to kick be kicked in another round? What do you mean by that? Can, can we reflate the system significantly once more? And I think that really has to be done in the next, I don't know, five years or something like that, because that sustainability really is, is is is is is is a problem. And not only gold bugs are talking about this anymore. I mean, you talk to Jeff Gunlock, you talk, you listen to Jeff Gunlock, you listen to Ray Dalio, listen to all the big guys, basically macro investing really like sounding the alarm bells louder and louder and, and, and it's, it's it's also really not very difficult to see, I think, especially when you look at the the refinancing costs. So in my view, in order to keep the field system alive, really what has to happen is probably an inflation, another round of, of inflation. And then basically the question is if, if they can stop the inflation, you probably need to devalue the dollar 50% or whatever to, to get to more sustainable debt levels. And, and that could be achieved in, in, in three years or four years with like 1020% inflation for 2-3 years. But then the, the difficult task is, is, is, is, is getting it back to, to, to lower rates. I mean, one has to say the Fed did not did, did, did do quite a good job bringing the inflation down. Even though Peps officially it's, it's, it's, it's much lower than than reality. But, but inflation rates have come down. Prices obviously have not. But, but it's all about the inflation rate when it comes to, when it comes to sustainability. And, but I think we need much more, the system needs much more. And, and, and we, we'll see what, what that will do to, to society also and to like think about all the pension funds and think about insurance companies. The big pools of capitals will, will, will be hit very hard by, by, by another round of inflation. And I, I don't really see a way around, around another round of inflation. So there that, that will be quite, I think quite a challenging environment in the next years. That's, that's a scary thought, 'cause I think the last that I've seen in terms of the US, it's for every $8 of new debt issuance, you're creating $1.00 of of GDP growth. And that is an incredibly disconcerting stat. And then you couple that with the economic data that's been released in recent months, whether it's the Michigan consumer confidence number that came in well below expectations. We had a terrible jobs report this week. There is again that FDIC report that the banking sector is, is a bit wobbly right now. And they've done everything they can to bring down the rate of inflation. As you mentioned, they've done a pretty good job at that. But we find ourselves in a situation where prices are still high, we have potential liquidity crisis on the horizon. We're issuing insane amounts of debt, trillion dollars every hundred days since last year. And it's not doing enough to like so $8 of new debt for $1.00 GDP growth. And that's not doing the trick to think of like what that number actually has to hit to to to drive growth that reinflates the economy is there's almost mind numbing, somewhat scary. Yeah. Yeah, I think this. Or go ahead, Mark. I was just on that on that point about the $8 get you $1.00, you know the term we used to have in the trading desk for a trade that that was unprofitable was yeah, that's hard to make up on volume. So like you can't even be faster or because it's just going to lose your money every day. Marty on that and the. A. Corollary or a byproduct of that debt creation is as we're seeing and we started to show about the increase in gold purchases by central banks, especially, you know, China, India, Russia and and Japan is that the the next buyer is not has not been created yet on the Treasuries. So what the Fed is doing now, instead of the Treasury being an asset post Bretton Woods to be stored and used and leveraged to protect your currency, it is now a liability and it is being pushed back into the market just when the producer, the treasury is making more. So the Fed is now or the the banking system is, is looking at changing this, this Byzantine regulation called supplementary leverage ratio. That was emergency, an emergency put in during COVID. It means, hey, listen, banks, you can buy as many treasuries as you want and we won't charge you. So in other words, you get free interest even though then it wasn't a lot. They're looking to bring that back in. So back about the bank failures that Marty and Mark you talked about, about the FDIC, was it 60 odd banks, half a trillion dollars of losses unrealized. And Mark, you mentioned banking losses in the running banks. I think the Fed's OK with this. I think they, as you said Mark, they will turn on the money printing machine when they need to. The Treasury will print debt. the Fed is not going to be buying. What they're going to be doing is having the purchases being done by the banks. So their balance sheet may only go up a little bit, but now our the remaining money center banks will be the repositories and that'll be where effectively monetization of that happens. I know that was a big long segment, but the Fed has created new tools and this is another one. And all it means is that the debasement will continue, but with a different flavor. Yeah. Are you referencing the fact that they manipulated Basel 3 recently to take treasuries out of the reserve ratio? And so now that you give the commercial banking system basically the the go ahead to go buy as many treasuries as they want. So create another demand driver outside of the Fed. So look like they're directly monetizing the debt. Yep. And and this is boring stuff. I mean, we care about it. It's because we that's what we do for a living. But you know, it's, it's going to have an impact and it's, and it's a driver. I think it's, I think Marty, this is one of the reasons why we're seeing, you know, Bitcoin up, punching through the low 70s again today for a number of reasons, but that's one of them. Well, with that reserve ratio, Mark Valik, I don't know if you have any thoughts on this, but was that, I mean there was a large discussions here in the US, particularly around the end of BTFP was a 12 month program initiated in March or April of 2023 that came due and and people were speculating about whether or not the Fed would extend that facility. They didn't they, they stayed true to their word and wound it down. But then shortly after, this reserve ratio requirement was changed, and was that effectively a continuation of BTFP? Maybe not the exact same facility, but one can argue that the facility isn't necessary because the treasuries aren't part of the reserve ratio anymore. I think thoughts Mark just articulated are very interesting and thought about similar things. I mean, money printers are in the business of printing money, right? And they're getting more and more sophisticated in it. And I think there are very there, there are various reasons. I mean, people like also the people in, in, in, in, in these positions, they are also aware of these problems. And I guess they are thinking about solutions or at least ways to be able to kick down the can another another mile or however long they can do it. So, so that could be an interesting, interesting way to do it, an elegant way to do it, more more sophisticated way to do it. I mean, it doesn't solve the problem, but it, it, it, it postpones the problem. Another interesting, I think way I, I heard, I think Paul Ryan talking about this regulatory framework for stable coins and specifically referencing them being, I think 16th largest buyer of treasury bills, right already without the regulation. And basically for making, making stable coins through, through a regulatory scheme or a regulatory improvement. Even more interesting for offshore investment investments and and and being able to basically, perhaps he didn't say that, but that's my view counter the D dollarization, which may be going on from from central banking side via the private banking, sorry, via via the private sector. So, so the dollarization I don't know for, for for offshore investors, people from, I don't know, India to Dubai or wherever sending back and forth stable coins, which would perhaps be regulated have the stamp of approval of a of AUS regulatory system could be quite attractive for, for being used even more as they already are being used. And specifically with the thought of attracting new dollar buyers, right, the treasury buyers. So, so, so they are thinking about these things and, and the perhaps probably will come up with, with, with new innovative ways. I think that probably will, is may also be the reason why as far as I know, it doesn't look like, as if the fat coin would, would come. So, and I think that's quite a smart move. Basically outsourcing this to the private sector and having, having overseas investors invest into stable coins, coins and, and sucking up fewer treasuries on the way. So we're gonna, this game is going to be perhaps longer than than we anticipate. But yeah, at some point, I don't know. I mean, the problem still remains that the, that the budget is in a structural deficit. And so you, you always have to keep, to pull another rabbit out of the out of the head. And I I I guess at some point you run out of rabbits. Yeah, the money printer is in the business of printing money. That's the that is the title. I know, I know we're tight on time. I think the the thing I wanted to or at least say before we wrap is Mark, I appreciate you coming on. I think this is a big narrative that's only going to increase this dynamic between gold and Bitcoin because you talked about we don't know how long this lasts, whether it's five to 10 years plus. But I think a lot of times on the Bitcoin side, we forget that like the notion is out there and I know we probably don't believe it here. Anybody hears that Bitcoin goes from one trillion to 10 trillion and then gold stays at par. And the reality is gold marches up at this at the same pace or, you know, not same pace, but relative. And this will continue and this is how we get out of all this. And so that dynamic will continue to exist with institutions, individual investors. And I think we'll start to see that these synergies play out more as more people are educated on the you know, we've been on two sides of the spectrum, I think is why they haven't converged too much. You have somebody on the gold side, they're generally older and come from an Austrian background. And then you have something on the Bitcoin side that's more tech forward and not thinking about gold. And I like to joke around, it's like when two disparate ideas converge or or have sex, that's when a magic happens. And I think that there's a lot of interesting stuff when gold and Bitcoin coming together for the next, call it 10 to 20 years that I don't think we talk about well enough on the Bitcoin side. The gold bugs and the Bitcoiners are fighting each other need to put down their swords and realize that we're all philosophically aligned around sound money and the fact that the governments and central banks have completely corrupted money, I think. I. Think we're all fighting the same fight. The implementation may be different to varying degrees, but philosophically, at its core, I think we're we're all very aligned. And it's a lot fun. It's a lot. It's a lot of better time on the Bitcoin side. I like how Mark said he went to, you know, both conferences. And that's the thing you hear from like Larry Leopard. He's like, yeah, I just kind of got tired of losing. He showed up at the conferences. He found a bunch of young people that, you know, you said greed in in some of those notions. I think that exists. But there's also this notion we can actually build a a scalable world. You said it's going to save us. There's that hope that lives on the other side of, you know, you need a digital money for a digital world. Right. I hope so. And we all think that's going to happen. And let's let's hope it's it. It will. And we'll hopefully enjoy the fruits of new, new world at some point. Yeah. And. With all this being said, I do want to make sure that we plug the annual report from In Gold We Trust backed by Incrementum. This, this year's report, it's over 420 pages long and it's just if you're looking to dive into the intricacies of what's going on in the geopolitical landscape, how markets are reacting to these actions on the geopolitical stage, and why Bitcoin and gold specifically makes sense within a portfolio and what portfolio construction may look like. I think this is a a piece that should be read widely by anybody who's taking this this stuff seriously. Yeah, thanks for the shout out. It's available for free on in gold we trust dot report. By the way, we we've been writing about Bitcoin I think since 2015 and have a chapter in there every year. And our last last year's contribution, we wrote about exactly what you just mentioned body regarding the, the, the, the civil war between the sound money and within the sound money camp. And he said, let's unite. And actually that's the differences aren't aren't so big and actually that both go together. This year I wrote a small chapter regarding free gold and potentially free Bitcoin system, which I think is also an interesting thought, perhaps once central banks start integrating Bitcoin into their reserves. Because that's actually, I think still the fundament of of of of the system still is gold. Even though we have that most of the system is debt based, but the equity of the system currently still is, is gold. That's why central banks do have gold. And once they start adding, adding Bitcoin to their reserves, that could basically perhaps reflate the system in a positive way. So perhaps one doesn't have to read all the 400 pages, but I think it's for everybody. There's something in there. Go check it out in gold. We trust dot report Mark thank you for your time. Thank you for being on the cutting edge of all this, really advocating for Bitcoin to the gold crew for for many years now. Because again, like I said and you just reiterated, I think we're all aligned need to put down our swords and this fight is bigger than the individual assets that that we may favor over the other. So yeah, that was great. Mark Connors, Michael, anything else you guys want to add? No. Thanks for joining, Mark. We very much appreciate it. Hopefully we'll see you in the States or we'll see you in Europe sometime this year or next. Yeah, thanks. For the invitation, gentlemen. All right. Thanks again, Marco. Thanks, Marty. Great. Thanks, Mike. Have a great day everybody. Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the show. If you found the information valuable, please share the episode with a friend or leave a rating on your favorite podcast app. All the links we discussed in today's show will be in the show notes inside your podcast app. Before we finish, a quick reminder that On Ramp Media is for informational and entertainment purposes only, and nothing should be construed as investment or legal advice. Regardless of where you are on your Bitcoin journey, we'd love to hear from you. Visit onramp Bitcoin com contact schedule consultation with one of our private client advisors.
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