The Great Repricing: Gold, Bitcoin, and the End of Easy Money

[Music] Let's be clear, Bitcoin is an international asset. >> We are spending like drunken sailors. >> Bitcoin is the only economic entity where the supply is unaffected by the demand. >> If you want to preserve your wealth, you have to convert that currency into an asset that's scarce, desirable, portable, durable, and maintainable. Welcome back to Scarce Assets, a podcast by On-Ramp Institutional. In this episode, we sat down with Josh Far, founder of Scottsdale Mint and the Wyoming Reserve, who brings 20 years of experience in the precious metal space. We unpacked the convergence between precious metals and Bitcoin, the sound money thesis behind both, and why nation states are reclaiming physical ownership of strategic assets like gold and soon we believe Bitcoin. At on-ramp, we help institutions prepare for the shift. Our multi-institution custody eliminates single points of failure and provides the foundation for secure long-term Bitcoin ownership. We work with family offices, pensions, and endowments through investment vehicles like the on-ramp Bitcoin trust, which offers security-like exposure similar to an ETF, but with inind delivery, multi-jurisdiction custody, and multi-institution custody allowing for direct ownership of Bitcoin. We also offer advisory services for institutions navigating this new asset class who want to avoid the pitfalls that investors have historically fallen into. If your organization is thinking about Bitcoin or already beginning to allocate, we would love to talk. Shoot me a note, jackonrampbitcoin.com or book a consultation on our website. I hope you enjoyed this week's episode. Okay, we're recording. It is uh another episode of Scarce Assets. This week we're joined by Josh Far and my co-host Michael Tanguma. Josh, thank you for joining us. just a quick intro in my words and then want to hand it over uh to you to give a little bit more context on your background. So, you're the founder and CEO of Scottsdale Mint and the CEO of the Wyoming Reserve, which I did a little bit of homework ahead of this call yesterday. Pretty fascinating concept there, but I'm looking forward to diving into your professional background today spanning uh precious metals, but also the the Bitcoin space. I guess you think of yourself as a sound money guy, which I would say the two of us do as well. So, thanks for joining us, Josh. How are you doing today? >> Yeah, thanks for having me. Doing doing well. Um it's July here in Wyoming. A lot of rodeos, concerts. Uh it's a good time to be uh to be here and not traveling, frankly. >> I love it. Well, yeah, it's a pleasure to meet you. Excited for this conversation. We have a lot of people on that, you know, focus on Bitcoin and digital assets, but we have less conversations focused on the precious metals market. So I think this will resonate with a lot of our audience because as you know just kind of a similar thesis behind gold, silver, bitcoin thinking about the fiscal year responsibility of the government, geopolitical concerns etc. But would love to just give you an opportunity to express more about your uh let's say core philosophy investment thesis around precious metals how you got involved in the space and then we can see where that takes us. >> Yeah sure. to make sure uh those watching that might be digital asset friendly. I am pretty much the opposite of Peter Schiff. So um yeah, kind of um yes, definitely stay tuned to to to the chat today. Um yeah, so I was one of the odd ones that uh originally wanted to go into finance. uh was an intern at Smith Barney when I was in college and then 911 happened and ended up changing my major to risk management and then got into the the brokerage world and when I was 20 I think it was about 24 years old I landed a billion-dollar gold mining company uh as as as one of my clients essentially handled anything from trade credit to political risk to managing their their gold and movement of materials uh solve problems environmental things, all all sorts of stuff. Uh, but solved their problems and then got referred into other other mining companies. So, ended up running probably close to about a dozen publicly traded mining companies, gold, silver, copper, and pretty much mainly worked directly with the CFOs. And so, I got to see kind of the the the hedging, you know, the the the capital deployment, you know, just just everything. And really fell in love with metals. And that was this was um this would have been prefinancial crisis. So me in my 20s, you know, the only the only crisis I saw was the dot blow up, which uh which is kind of why I decided uh who's going to give a 20some year old um money to manage when I didn't understand, you know, as a as a as a younger younger kid, didn't understand the what I call the brickandmortar world. And when that those dot coms blew up in in ' 01, um, yeah, it was a, you know, pretty much a smooth sailing, you know, for for the economy up until ' 08. And when that crisis hit, I had an idea and ended up implementing it and started what's now known as Scottsdale Mint in in08. started in my my guest bedroom was essentially I wanted to create a brand within the precious metal space that wasn't just chasing after grandma's money. Something that was a little bit more attuned with um how things are are are done uh done today. And you know fast forward now what's been almost 17 years. Uh Scott Mint manufactures for 20 plus foreign governments, central banks. So we produce their legal tender gold and silver coins. We do stuff for private banks, large private banks. We make anything from the investment grade product to collectibles, gifts, everything in between. And and actually later this year, we'll be launching homegoods. Uh I probably it might be next year, jewelry where we just produce really anything to do with pretty much anything to do with uh precious metals. And um my my other company that you mentioned is called the Wyoming Reserve. Um we're we're that is essentially a vaulting operation. So it's a it's a high security vault operation that works just like the JP Morgans of the world. Uh JP Morgan is one of the largest holders of silver in the world. They have quite a bit of gold right next to the Fed. Then they operate that vault. They make money on thirdparty storage and then they take their their assets that they also own and they find way to to create business income off of that. So our vaulting operation is not too dissimilar from that except that we're an opportunity zone. So our equity investors and our in our stock get special um uh considerations with uh capital gains um potential tax-free appreciation on on our stock etc. But we're also in a foreign trade zone. So our vault operation is actually uh not subject to tariffs. So we can bring things in that are being tariff, store it in our facility. Uh it could be held here essentially forever uh or or shipped back outside outside the United States tariffree. And part of that vaulting operation is actually built for where where we're headed, which is as the real world assets go onto the blockchain. So that's been uh essentially a passion of mine for for a long time. I have held Bitcoin on the balance sheets of my companies for longer than Michael Sailor has. So, I just don't use the debt strategy that he does. So, I'm um while I'm very much focused on, you know, precious metals is kind of the old it's the old school. It's been around for thousands of years and it's it's not going away. I I I do think those that thought gold was going to go away, I think 2025 has signaled uh to the world it is now outperforming bond at bonds at any basically any interval that you look at. It's now beating almost most the stock market um over the last 25 years and that's even with the S&P switching out um you know who who's in their in in their in their uh pool. So yeah, I think you know over the last 17 years, you know, it was Austrian economics for those that paid attention to, you know, the Roger Ves of the world, you know, that's that's how he got into Bitcoin. I was not as smart as Roger. I was on uh on a website and I was looking at the Bitcoin price. was around a dollar. And I was on the website looking at it and I said to myself, "This feels like kind of kind of like Dungeons and Dragons and Magic the Gathering." It just like this isn't for me. So, I didn't I did not click the buy button. Uh that was that would have been really good at the time. Um but and that's actually that that's for those that don't know that was that was kind of how that was the Bitcoin community. that was Mount Gaus was was essentially uh Magic the Gathering guys that really uh launched a lot of these things. So it was very interesting. Um so I've I've definitely watched the evolution of I call the the digital assets uh you know the the thesis that you know of of fiat currency that no one even knew what it was. They thought it was a car um only you know just seeing that evolve over over a long time. So, that's kind of a really fast, you know, kind of quick overview and then we can definitely dive in uh into things a little further. >> Yeah, I appreciate you running through that and been super excited to have this conversation. Um, I thought I was a little early to to thinking about the gold and Bitcoin, not only trade, but how they're going to play out. Um, but it sounds like you were way early, about 20 years early in the sense of there's a few themes you touched on. One is, um, I didn't realize and that's awesome about working with sovereigns on the legal tender stuff. I think there's a notion of um in in the Bitcoin space, people understand there's the right and wrong ways to do them and that are filled with counterparty risk. And I like in like Bitcoin is like accelerated business cycles because of not only it's not really even the having, it's just that the fervor and animal spirits come in and there's no bailout. So you get to see in real time what are the right and wrong ways. And I think a lot of the quote unquote gold bugs, I wouldn't consider you that, but the folks that have understood you don't want like GLD. You can't take delivery. It's full of counterparty risk. And so people have been stacking, but that's been a smaller percentage. And those individuals have understood what's best in class. And now the rest of the market is naturally going to have to figure that out because that's going to become like a core part of their portfolio. um at least that's part of our like my personal thesis and I think um where you sit and what ties that all together is the notion and it's still um you joked about Magic the Gathering. You could kind of say this is that's what's kept a lot of people out because a lot of Bitcoin people still act like you know Magic the Gathering uh collectors in the sense that like a couple years ago it was 250k Bitcoin had to get to to to hit uh parody with gold. Now it's uh it then it was 500k uh previously and now it's a little bit higher. But point being is like gold's not a magnet and then Bitcoin just uh hits and it's like surpasses. Gold is foundational money for trade and has been for thousands of years and it's kind of like nonsensical to think it would just go away. And I think a lot of the individuals in the Bitcoin community believe that. And I slowly started coming to this realization from a different angle which was just volatility and old people. They can't just ape into BTC and watch their portfolio go down 75%. and I started like pulling at that thread and realizing that this is just going to be tied um together for a while. So, um yeah, all of that just tied into excited for this conversation because I think you uh other folks like Dan Tapiier that came from the gold space and then we've had Tad Smith on as well and Tad's interesting because similarly he just looked at the world from a scarcity perspective. He was CEO of Subies and that was his notion of understanding Bitcoin. And it's like if there's only 21 million and people are subscribing some value to it, let me just underwrite where there has to be some kind of value to it. It sounds like that's how you first came in as well. >> Uh 100%. And you know and I kind of look at it like what what is the obviously Bitcoin is getting its energy its economic energy because people want to buy it and and I think you know early on I think the mo it's the thesis of why buy Bitcoin has changed a number of times which can be concerning but what continues to happen is people are buying it for different reasons and now you know at this you know in 25 we're seeing you know people are moving corporate balance sheets and they're adding they're adding Bitcoin to it and I think that's it's not just Micro Strategy, there's others, you know, jumping in in into into the into the mix. So, when you look at when you look at gold, you know, a lot of people think it it's it's like not even used and and we're not on a gold standard. And we're actually in a 50 just over 50 years experiment of not being pegged uh with with with gold for the US government. Um, and you were not even allowed to own gold outside of jewelry. So you weren't allowed to own bullion, you know, pre pre- Nixon. So Nixon cut it. Um so it was early 70s. So we're kind of in an experimental phase. But if you look at who is buying gold and this is where you know where it's there was a lot of people that bought gold during during COVID obviously, but I would say like the last 24 months has not been consumers. uh they're they're it has been the central banks and so they those are the groups that we are not allowed to know um who are who are the owners of them. I think some of us probably could could could guess some of the names behind them but we don't know their full ownership structure which is kind of interesting actually. So if you look at AML, anti-moneyaundering, know your customer, you know what that banks have to do. The only US government and anytime a senator or a congressman asked to audit um the Federal Reserve, they're they're shut down. And so it's it's kind of interesting how you know rules for me but not for thee. So um or vice versa. So yeah, it's an interesting it's an interesting metric. So they are continually buying physical gold and putting on their balance sheets. So this is this has been the trend that really I think it really got kicked off when and I think it was probably an error uh you know when when when the United States and the West seized physical assets from Russia and kicked them out of the Swift system. And so what we saw is even Europeans did that uh you know to Russia and and obviously there's there's understandable uh reasons. But when someone can have their basically a blacklist function on on their their money supply, they're going to start looking for alternatives. And I think those that were watching China in particular said, "Hey, if that can happen to to Russia, could that happen to us?" And so now you're seeing, we just was just this last week, the bricks nations, they're all meeting and they're putting together a whole new financial system. Trump, you know, Trump comes in even before he took office. I think it was right around Christmas time, he posts on X a warning shot to bricks. Don't create a new currency and don't back it. He said back it. And a lot of people didn't even think about what is he talking about. He's talking about gold. So then suddenly he comes into office and then insane amount of gold starts getting imported into the United States. So uh and I've been talking on on my ex I started talking last week that the mineral war is on. Like it is it is definitely on. And so you know Africa has pretty much been gobbled up by China. They're grabbing uh and a lot of people don't know mo there are rare earth primary deposits out there but there's very few. But a lot of gold mines, copper mines, they also produce byproducts that could be a rare earth are all a strategic mineral. And so China has been sucking up a lot of, you know, resources that are needed. And I I'm going to dovetail this into how it goes into Bitcoin and eventually energy and AI. Um, minerals are at the forefront. And I think we could we could all agree whoever is mining Bitcoin controls the future. If you can't run servers, uh, and you can't, if you don't have the energy to power all this infrastructure, uh, you're going to lose militarily. You can't control AI. Um, this is why coal power plants aren't being turned off anymore. Now they're like, let's extend the lives. And then now suddenly, you know, nuclear is being being adopted again. And so, yeah, there's a there's a major major race. So, you just look at strategic assets. We do need we need water. Water is not going to go away. We need food. we need. So you start looking at all these critical assets and and to why and so if if we find something that replaces food or water, right? That scarcity supply demand curve changes. So this is this is what makes gold a big driver. Central banks decided to to dump it. Yeah. Gold gold price is going to go way down and then it's going to turn into is it just a pretty thing? We're seeing that in diamonds. You know, diamonds have not done well in the last couple years. And why? because it's the real diamond. While it it might be somewhat scarce, it's a false supply, but now they've got, you know, the lab grown, which you can't really even tell the difference to the naked eye. And so now, like the Debeers of the world who kind of had, you know, call it the control, you know, the diamond world is slipping and then less people are getting married and spending the same, you know, back in the day, what was it? Three three month salary is what you had to buy for your fiance or whatever it was. That that world isn't really there. So, we're starting to see that that price has, you know, waned compared to to to other things. So, yeah, it's a it's these are interesting times. So, I think when you think about investing in something, you don't invest in something for where it is today. It's where is it going? And so, is it going to be adopted more or less in in the future? And so, when I when I got into precious metals, I was already investing in in mining companies. So, I bought my first mining company was a copper copper mining company when copper was 50 cents a pound. Well, now it's $5.50 a pound. So, uh, same concept with with Bitcoin. You know, in the future, it's going to be really hard to own one. It or it's getting harder today than it was a few years ago. So, if more and more people are going to want to, you know, clamor and own, you know, a a resource that that is is is limited uh in supply, it's a nice thing to own. Uh, and and it's it's it's definitely a nice thing to own. So I think as we kind of look around the world um countries distrust each other more than ever. Citizens distrust uh the institution and their politicians more than ever. I think uh maybe a good portion of the United States had maybe more trust in the in the political system and just we've seen with some of the I'd say disappointment uh around uh a certain case um you know did someone die or not and why and all this stuff. I think people are going wait a minute and then you know Elon came in right he's saying um we're going to cut save do all this and then suddenly you know a big swing over the last you know number of weeks where we can't cut our way out of it so we're going to spend our way into it because that's that's not really an exit either. So suddenly this is where you know Bitcoin is we're at all-time highs here you know and gold gold has surged this year silver is now moving moving up nicely um you know even even some of the alts in in the blockchain space is starting to move because people are I think sensing the world of liquidity the faucets about to turn off be turned on um so this is I think it a very interesting convergence uh in into things um so yeah there's not in gold there's not many there's not many people in it. There's not many that that do what I that what my what what my company does. Um and now tariffs are also here. So, you know, there's not many there's not many mints not many manufacturers of gold gold and silver products in the US. So, some of that stuff is being tariffed even though there was an exemption. Uh but certain fabricated products are being hit. So, we're we've been hiring the last two months. Uh, you know, just to just to handle, you know, the in in the inbound, you know, for contract manufacturing, for banks, for foreign governments, and for for a lot of things that that's going on. Uh, I think you're going to see, you know, there's no doubt within within the Bitcoin space. Um, you know, I'm seeing there's funds out there. They're raising capital. They're deploying it into, you know, companies investing within within this this sector. Um, I think it's an interesting an interesting time where I don't think our government is going to or or governments plural any government's going to get out of this without um being incredibly bumped and bruised. And consumers, we we have to take things into our own um our own decision- making for for our future. So whether you're 20 or you're 60 uh or anywhere in between or beyond, you know, you're you are thinking about what is this world going to look like? Can I afford it? Nothing really makes sense today. I mean, even the stock market, you know, that was kind of my generation. I'm in my mid-40s now. You know, you would just you just buy you just buy the stocks. Well, back a number of years ago was based on, you know, there was how do you value something? price to earnings ratios and different all that stuff is it does nothing makes sense anymore. So and now you know most of the stock market is driven by like a select handful of companies like Nvidia for example. So yeah this is a >> it's an interesting time uh interesting convergence. There's a lot of unknowns but man is it also a time for I think for those that are grasping it not listening to the mainstream. They're grasping it and doing things on their own. It's also a huge opportunity to to to to not only survive whatever mess we're heading into, but actually thrive. >> Agreed. Josh, you made a lot of great points throughout um you know, the past couple minutes here. One thing I did want to just dig into a little bit deeper is this concept of a revaluation that's underway. Right. I think somewhere you had written about the rally in gold is not a hedge, it's a revaluation. And I want to tie this into a couple of the themes that you just mentioned because as you know we operate in the Bitcoin space and we have a lot of connections in the policy side. So we've we've spoken with policy groups and state legislators and there's and even just with the genius bill today, right? And so there's a lot of momentum and I think there's DC and then also states are starting to wake up to the fact that the US has a strategic advantage as it relates to Bitcoin relative to other countries and particularly adversarial countries. And one of the interesting stats behind that is about 40% of the Bitcoin wealth sits within the United States and then a lot of the companies that operate in the Bitcoin space sit within the US as well. And I would love to get your thoughts on that. But then also just given your your background for the past 20 years in precious metals, how do you think about the strategic advantage or lack of advantage that the U United States might have relative to China or Russia as it relates to gold? Right? Like do they does the US have a strategic advantage there or are these adversarial nations better suited for a world where gold continues to be revalued higher? >> Yeah. So obviously we don't know exactly how much gold is in Fort Knox or not. Elon was talking about it, even Trump. And we don't know. Um I have my theories. Um it's quite possible some of it may have been missing, lent out, sold. My thinking is if you're going to bring up a problem to the public that no one's talking about, you probably have already fixed it. That's that's that's me. But if we look back at the like the Breton Woods when when we all when the world kind of went you know and and created the World Bank um the IFC the the world of finance the United States hold I think at the time twothirds of the world's gold. So that is not the same today. I don't think they have twothirds but I believe they're depending on what report you're looking at stated they're still the largest. Now, China, and again, I'm going to go with that. We know China has been um a a huge vacuum machine of sucking physical gold all around the world uh to their shores since then. I think that's why you're seeing Trump like kind of push push the US forward. It really comes down to trade routes. Um you know, people say a lot of times people when they say, you know, the United States is not the policeman of the world, but I don't think people understand what that means. Yes, there's problems. But part of the agreements after World War II is that the US would would allow trade in the world, you know, why is piracy and why why do most ships are able to to sail free? Well, that's, you know, the US's navy plays a gigantic role in that. Well, there is problems out there for the most part. You know, the last number of years we you know, trade trade exists. Um, you're we're entering a world of I would say we're being bifrocated. So access and allies is being created. You know, you're either on you're either going to be team USA or you're not. And you're seeing that those alignments arrange. There's a lot of, you know, there's the BRICS organization. There's some that like India is one of those that's very aligned with the US. They also kind of fight China at the border. Uh what side are they going to choose? So um you know at this point it's not a kinetic um scenario but we're we've been in a resource in a trade war and that's what tariffs are all about. We're upsetting the upsetting the system. And so when you look at gold you say well who has the resources in ground and who can protect it. So uh we were just talking I think offline um before we got on you know in the news you know Bareric which is one of the largest gold companies in the world um just had their resource pillaged. They had helicopters land. The Mali government landed and and took 117 million in physical gold from them. Well, they're Canadian. I I tweeted out on on X, if that was a US company, I don't know if this would have happened. And so, this is a different way of thinking because there's repercussions. Like, if you kidnap an American, that's why American passports are more important than another passport somewhere because we're treated differently by other governments. They take our nation a little more seriously. Now I'm not saying look bad guys are going to do bad things uh but there's different repercussions and so because of the US military presence Canada doesn't have military you know of doing anything like that. So uh I made also a prediction that barracks probably going to move their headquarters to the United States. Why would you um doicile in Canada? And so I just saw the news like a day later they're looking at selling their last Canadian asset. So this could this be the start of it? So I'm going to I'll make a prediction. They're going to buy a US company, they'll switch their headquarters to the US. Uh, and Trump is pro their administration has to already be in conversation with. So, you know, resources are, but what I was getting at earlier too, when you're pulling gold out of the ground, there's a lot of byproduct of metal. When you're pulling out copper, there's a lot of byproduct. There's a lot of critical minerals. Like, we always hear about rare earth minerals, but a lot of times it's just small small stuff that there's no primary mind for. And so while China captures it, there is a big issue. And I think regulation has been hurting the US's resources. And so uh some of you on the digital side under Biden, the US regulatory environment for blockchain assets was terrible, right? It it was terrible. If you're a bad actor, you went to another country and you did it over there. In the resource space, it's the same way. So let's say a lot of Latin America, a lot of Africa, US companies and European companies can't directly touch those mines. So typically it's the bad guys, it's the cartels, it's the criminals and a lot of that material ends up either in China or Dubai and then it makes its way to Switzerland. So who is sucking all that material out? And there is definitely a need for reform um within the banking sector as relates to to to precious metals. So we're uh the gold the gold and silver industry is regulated very similar to like to banks. So it's a it's a tough you know compliance regulatory. We're seeing this with digital assets that's been treated at times terribly. um obviously much better now with a new SEC chair, but uh and and Trump Trump's administration knew that, hey, if we want to be in the future, we we have to make it we have to make it easier. So, I I think you'll see a new mining bill uh out um later this year in 25 uh to to make resources flow better back to the United States to be held here, vaulted here, uh used for used for defense, um used for technology. if we don't have I think if if Elon was on with this right now um he doesn't like to talk about silver because he needs so much of it for for everything he does there are strategic assets that the United States has to have if it wants to if it wants to propel propel itself into the future. So AI chips all all this stuff needs all these very expensive materials. If we want to launch into the hydrogen economy you need aridium you need rathinium. Where is that? South Africa. Well, we probably want the United States probably wants South Africa to align itself with the United States um as opposed to aligning it to to to the other side. So, this is it's going to be an interesting it's going to be an interesting number of years here. And you know, I'd say the the US seems like they were asleep at the wheel for maybe decades when China was going around cutting deals. They were doing airports, schools, building infrastructure all over Latin America, the Caribbean, um, and and, uh, South America and different places. And so they were getting, you know, sweetheart deals. And while the United States is not perfect, you know, I think we could look at, you can look at how, you know, maybe maybe some of these other entities like China treats these other these other countries, it may not be the most ethical um, either. So, I do think the United States is working hard under this new administration to mend old ties. Um, we we saw this with Panama. Sometimes you have to use a little bit of um a little bit more than just talk. It may have been like, you know, literally uh the military will be invading you tomorrow if you don't do this now. And so, I think when Cruz went down there, Panama said it's done. We're we're aligning ourselves. So, I think Western Hemisphere is critical. So, hemispheres are critical. So where where all this ties in if if the US can lock down this is no this is why they're talking about Greenland uh can Canada become a state you know it's it's a lot of it has to do with resources and so if the United States we may lose uh Taiwan at some point um you're going to lose probably a good chunk of Africa um it's it's north um North and South America um is is probably the the cl the the critical component Europe's kind of not as important anymore to be frank uh They're kind of very dovish. They don't even know how to take care of their own citizens. Um they don't know what they want to do with their future. They're turning off, you know, Germany turned off all its nuclear power plants, lost all their industry, and now now they're now they've got huge problems. Meanwhile, France is pretty happy uh because they have their nuclear power. Poland is about to become the largest economy. Poland's more aligned with the United States. So, this is this is definitely interesting. And where all this ties into, if we think about it too, is like if we look at stable coins, the one stable coin that's kind of being kicked out of certain western is is is is which one that you're what which one have you seen kicked off exchanges the most? >> Tether. >> Yeah. So this isn't talked about much. So then what's the one that's being promoted the most in the US circle? >> USC. Yeah. So if we start thinking about who do you think has the most tether and who do you think has the most circle if we think politically it's China it's China on one side US on the other. So this is part of this whole like bifurcation of the world. um the the bifurcation of the world like what what what are you on you know to where you know tether's being cut out of of of the system and and you know so this is yeah it's it's we're we're leaving globalism and we're going into you know a much different environment and I don't think people understand that fully at at a macro level like why why tariffs I and I my my take on tariffs is Trump is also trying to get US companies to get with the program and so sometimes I can't you know he can't tell people exactly what's going to happen but imagine if we can't trade with China at all at some point so bring bring that infra back to the US >> yeah bringing resources um real quick just to double click on the tether I think there's two components one is um I think at an overarching like macro level there's just an arbitrage from from free money or dollars uh into hard assets right And that's the game. I think it's been the game for a long time, but specifically the past 5 years, whether it's um land, anything to do with land, whether it's energy or resources, gold, BTC, um specifically, and Tether, you can kind of look at them as almost like the canary in the coal mine because what do they hold? I think a lot of people don't recognize that they have their treasury of Bitcoin. I think it's like 50 to 100,000 BTC, but they actually have 50 tons of gold and they're buying up um not only land and acreage, but also like data centers. And so to go a little further, you said before the the chat, you had some thoughts on the Genius Bill that just passed. How do you see that playing? Because there's an interesting dynamic with Tether because what you said there is an antagonistic version, but they're also getting really close with the administration, Lutnik. Um they got a couple spaxs now going to be, you know, funneling those dollars into the the equity market. So like how do you see that dynamic playing because it's almost two sides like antagonistic but also trying they're trying to like get their seat entrenched in the US financial markets. >> Yeah. While I am team America um I think all of us could say do we trust everything that every government bill does? And to me, if you just if we go back in time, if you look at how they name the bills, the Patriot Act, Inflation Reduction Act, it's like sometimes it's the direct opposite of actually what's happening. And so when you tell me this is genius and there's some great things in there, don't get me wrong. And I think it's going to pump some bags in there. But it also is going to benefit the old school banks of which you know the the whole thesis around blockchain, crypto, bitcoin, what the whole thesis is what >> this intermediation >> is getting away. Yeah. Taking out the minimum between you and your money. And so while you know they're saying it's anti- central bank digital currency, these are these are also currencies that have blacklist functions. And I don't know if people understand what this means. Is do you have a blacklist function on a $20 bill in your wallet? Nope. Do you have it on a gold bar? Nope. Well, digital assets now, they're all going to have blacklist functions. So, which means they can be seized. You can't, you know, you can't. So every stable coin that's this is kind of the back door um for I would call institutional control and then within within and then allow the old school banks that are so far behind guys like why shouldn't Kraken benefit the most. I mean Jesse Pal was the OG he even tells people don't even keep coins that you own on my exchange. keep them self self-costed and then now we're hearing oh put your you know you know keep it keep it inside keep it inside exchanges you know for the other guys it's and I and >> that makes sense but but that makes sense but curious where how do you reconcile that with because you can put like a blacklist on Bitcoin but you can't stop somebody from sending it or accepting it how do you reconcile the stable versus with a Bitcoin custody like interplay >> so you know stable coins are it is the future because people need a place to park capital. So until until Bitcoin doesn't move, it has volatility risk. Now, I think long-term that volatility is going to go down. We've already seen it. And and it's also nice when it's volatile to the upside. Wonderful problem. But the reason that stable coins exist, you know, in particular, let's say on the ETH side, is people need as they're trading, as they're buying, and they're accepting payment. How does a how does a shop accept payment in something that could drop 10 20% by the time they get to the office the next morning? It's difficult. So that's where stable coins kind of come in on on the currency, the money side of things. Um and so people need a place to park it. All that stuff is going to have blacklist function. So so to your point, yeah, maybe not Bitcoin, but then they're they're monitoring the on and the off ramps. So >> that so I also look at it from the construct of the stock market. Can you can we can I send you a share of Apple? Nope. I have to go through a brokerage firm. It's like and then you start looking at retirement accounts. It's essentially a grand. Now it's not Ponzi like multi-level marketing but it if you really look at the definition you blow it up. go. Yeah. If more people don't put money in and keep it in, then the other guy can't take it out. So, you know, if we look at the whole infrastructure of IRA, 401ks, it's all about taking that next generation's money and putting it in and putting in and putting it in, putting in and hopefully, you know, it pumps bags and people people are able to sell out. >> Yeah. So they don't like I don't think they really like Bitcoin the way it was say a number of years ago because you could go send in 100 grand to Coinbase or Kraken, make your transaction and send it out in minutes, right? Gone outside the system. So that's I think what they're trying to do is figure out how do we brick this capital so it can't leave. We can control it. Um >> i.e. ETFs and and public treasury companies. I know Jackson's a place you want to go, but I want to call out one thing just to say is uh >> because you're a study of like monetary history, so you you pro I'm sure you know this or read the book The Secrets of the Federal Reserve and you look at the 1913 act and it was literally the exact same like they were the same bills because I'm going down this like rabbit hole looking at the Great Depression. The same bill but they were just worded different and they pushed people in a certain direction. So after reading that it's like I don't trust anything that's like put in front of us. But >> so the reason I moved my company from Arizona to Wyoming was was there there there was a number of reasons. A lot of it a lot of prayer looking for somewhere that's going to treat me well. Um but a big component was a foreign trade zone in the event that Smoot Holly Act comes back. So this was four and a half years ago. Uh most people didn't know how to spell tariff correctly. Uh so here we are. To your point, history doesn't repeat itself always, but it sure does, you know. um sometimes look very similar. So here we are with tariffs uh back back on the table for the first time in modern history for the US. And yeah, we're seeing the same type of construct. So the monetary systems broke. We don't know exactly what it's going to look like on the other side. Uh this the the World Economic Forum, you know, guys, um you know, you own nothing and you will be happy. We'll be on subscriptions and you know, in the metaverse. Um, you know, and it's >> Jackson's a fellow. Jackson's a we fellow. So, just be I'm just messing around. >> Well, hey, maybe that's going to be great. Uh, so, but you a lot of us probably would say, "Yeah, maybe not so much." So, you know, I Hey, I own um metaverse real estate, but I also own physical real estate. I own physical gold. I have I'm I'm a pri I'm not a maxi but I'm a primary Bitcoin but I have a few other technologies that that I like. Um, I've got NFTTS, so I've, you know, been in, again, physical art. I've got digital art. So, and some went to nothing, some have done amazing. So, I've even had, you know, board apes. I've got Pudgy Penguins, you know, and people kind of laugh at it, but I could liquidate it and I'm pretty happy with it. But, you know what? You have to be what I want to be a part of is I want to be part of that digital revolution. I want to understand, I want to win, lose, bump my head, you know, have something work really great because if my company, if especially if as a gold guy, if I'm going to talk to an artist that wants to put something onto the blockchain or work with with someone else, you have to be you have to understand, you have to understand at least some of it. And I'm I there's a lot more I need to learn about, but you have to experience it. So, as real world assets do get onto the blockchain and people want to like right now I mentioned aridium, that's a probably a very interesting metal that most people don't know about that's going to be part of the hydrogen economy. Well, how do you invest in it? You really can't. Well, imagine if someone something was tokenized, right? But someone's going to have to be the the custodian. Someone has to audit it. And so, that's where where where our vault stands in. So, we're I'm essentially blockchain agnostic when it comes to thirdparty storage. Um, but my fund, going back to it, as we raise we raise capital. We're about to announce a second offering. Um, I think it'll be a hund00 million raise that we're going to announce here in a few weeks. We we we can hold up to 10% in Bitcoin. So, we hold our balance sheets consist of 90% physical metal and up to 10. And that's to keep our opportunity zone compliant. So that's that is what a pure asset like to own with with tax benefits. So yeah, we're in the space. Um we're in the space and you want to own things that that are rare and that people are going to want in the future. >> Totally agree. And Josh, I want to make sure we do have time to cover uh more specifically around the idea of like what you're doing with the Wyoming Reserve and physical vaults and you know why why investors from the sovereign level to the consumer need to think about that. I do I do want to touch on something though before we get there that will hopefully paint the picture because you had mentioned the idea about how you know the monetary system is deeply broken. I think that's something that, you know, both people in precious metals and bit, you know, in the Bitcoin space will almost always agree on, right? And one of the things that, you know, we're paying attention to is that there's about 12 trillion of federal debt that needs to be refinanced. Interest payments on the debt, you know, as you know, greater than defense spending. It's over a trillion dollars annually. Debt ceiling raised uh for the 79th time since 1960. um to the unit parties just continuing to kick the can down the road. And I'm just curious, you know, looking through the end of this year and into next, how you think about gold revaluation. Um, you know, Treasury Secretary Basent has talked about the um and I think you mentioned it as well just having to grow out of this debt problem and we'll see how that goes, right? But then he's also met mentioned Bretton Woods and a reordering of the monetary system. So, I'm just curious like before we get into why physical ownership is important, uh, because that's a good topic for us to discuss. I just want to better understand at least myself and I think the listeners will appreciate where you're coming from as it relates to just gold's role as a sovereign asset, a tier one asset on these balance sheets. Like what is that going to look like in the next year? >> Sure. Yeah. You know, in one sense people say gold is a fuddy duddy. It's an old asset, but that's also what is so nice about it. It's proven. it's tested. Um, so it's been around for, you know, thousands of years. It has re it's it's been the asset that settles war debt. It's it's it's an asset that right now is still being pledged and purchased at different banks as escrow in my opinion for future war financing. Number one buyer of gold last year was Poland at and and a third of it at the US Fed. Why is it not all in their country? Like, you know, if you look at history, it's, you know, for those that are watching Game of have ever watched Game of Thrones, the kings and queens, they're all battling, but where do they have to go to get their financing? The Iron Bank. And it's a it's a really good analogy when they walk into the room and they finance both sides of the war, and the winner has to pay the debts of the loser. So, that that physical gold's not going away. Um the fact that like not a lot of people promote gold like on TV they'll talk about it real quick and it just kind of scurries away. Maybe they have a mining company to exec on. Um like Black Rockck Black Rockck represents, you know, gigantic central banks. So do all the every major bank has a bullion division. JP Morgan is one of the biggest players in the world. They're they're not out there saying buy gold. They're not. I don't think they want competition. This is an asset class that's not supposed to be for people if if if you kind of think of it that way. And and in fact, you were not allowed to own it for the majority of the uh of of you know, the last century. So this is it's interesting to think like that. That's an asset that they that they want to control and it will be used in it. And and so going back to my you know, you have to have a military, you have to have water, you have to have food. Gold gold is not going to go away. It's just it's it's it's part of it even though everyone has said it's it's its demise. But now, you know, gold, if we kind of look back since 911, it it's kind of trading like a it's trading to it's doing better than almost everything outside of Bitcoin. So, if if we compare it to I realize you can pick highs, but 90 plus% of the blockchain space is garbage, right? It's it's done nothing. You know, went way up and went way back down. gold was like in the low 200s, you know, 20 just over 20 years ago, and now it's 3,300. That's that's a pretty good return for a boring, you know, lowrisk asset. And so, um, I think I I think you're also seeing US states, they're passing new, uh, regulation. They're really two, if if people are paying attention, I know you guys are, they're states are looking to hold Bitcoin on their balance sheets. They're also looking to hold gold. So, the state of Utah, the state of Wyoming just announced uh they're going to be adding gold. And you start looking at, and I don't have Utah's numbers in front of me. State of Wyoming has I know in one one of their funds, they've got $30 billion in a trust. And they run that like a sovereign wealth fund. And then they take um take those gains and manage it manage their budget. And so, when they say, "Hey, we're interested in buying gold." That's interesting. A little disclaimer. Uh my vault is listed uh we're publicly listed as a finalist with JP Morgan uh to hold the state's assets. Um should more know more later this summer. But you know, I think states are are looking saying, "Hey, I can't control the US dollar, but we're all we're all having problems. Almost every not every problem, but the majority of problems right now are all based on the inflation. They printed so much stinking money um during you know especially during co you know and I think it was when you start thinking of it inflation is a policy and we can't control it. It doesn't matter what politicians in it just we just spend spend spend. And so I I do think states are looking at at least at a local level and saying I can't control the money directly but maybe we can invest in different in different assets. So you're you're going to see a movement of states um to put together gold more gold is going to be purchased and held on the balance sheet. That that is something that's going to grow. Quick heads up for the scarce assets listeners. We're launching on-ramp IRA later this week. It's the first and only Bitcoin IRA built on multi-institution custody. That means there's no single point of failure, not one entity holding your Bitcoin and no need to manage keys yourself. Historically, the options were either self-custody, which could be risky over several decades for retirement, or a single custodian with unknown exposure and lack of transparency into how the assets held. We've built something better. A retirement grade solution designed for longevity, security, and peace of mind. If you want to be among the first to learn more, head to onrampbitcoin.com/ressearch and sign up for our newsletter. We'll be sharing the full details later this week. Hope you enjoy the rest of this episode. >> Yeah, that just actually um I hadn't looked deeply into it, but I pulled it up while you were chatting about um the Texas uh brings back sound money. Um it was effectively I didn't realize like the implementation was you can house uh the gold I think at the sovereign depository there in Texas and then ultimately like get issued a card to spend it. Now I don't know how much traction that'll get. Um but there's been to your point a lot of demand and interest from sound money across the board. I think um there's what I'm curious and it kind of ties to what Jackson was referencing about what you specifically do on the vaulting side is this notion of like repricing revaluation that we were we've I don't want to call it a lie but I guess it kind of has been a lie that people's wealth has been put into you mentioned multiples in the equity markets and how they're defined um the equity markets like that's a false construct when people say money is a false construct I don't think that's necessarily true I think there's certain attributes or properties to make a good form of money and gold had it for thousands or has it and then Bitcoin mirrors it when it comes to portability, finance, scarcity and um but we moved away from that for for a number of reasons and I think that the market is moves with the sovereigns right they move with the powers that be and the powers of B that have ultimately started to uh repric gold and the rest of the market will be catching up but where I still don't know where that goes is how that integrates uh in a way with tradi and your traditional bank account Right? Because you can kind of glimpse into that maybe with Bitcoin and being able to buy spot through your bank eventually and then you can transfer between stables and BTC. But I think very similar is gold's going to play a role in that because it's again a little crazy to believe the 75year-old or even 55year-old is just going to say, "Oh, now gold's my savings account. I'm going to liquidate my, you know, a large percentage of my portfolio from bonds or stocks to go into BTC." Um, for all the reasons you referenced with gold's track record. And so just curious like how you think about that and then how uh your business but also other businesses like that are going to build best-in-class products because that's what I think what we do at on right now like Coinbase isn't bestin-class if you're thinking about counterparty risk and ultimately have a long time horizon no single custodian has lasted over like call it 10 years in the Bitcoin space and there's a reason for that and similar with ETFs we know you can't redeem them and so the market's still so early they're okay with an omnibus pulled wallet with all this BTC but we understand if you've in the space, that's not really how you want to manage. If you have material wealth, and I think that's similar to gold. Some people play around with some GLD, but if you're going to have a material cornerstone of your wealth, you want it in a secure way. I'd love to hear not only what you do, but then how you think that's going to play out because I think we agree that's where the market goes. But there's a lot of education from going into overinflated 50x uh, you know, revenue multiple of whatever stock you want to pick versus holding sound money. >> Yeah. I I'm not one to think that we're going to be using gold bars and coins at the grocery store. So I I don't I think it's the I look at more of as an underpinning of an economy as a faith. um think of it as it is it is trusted in an economy is what and if we go back to you know talking about JP Morgan here if we if we go back to the history you know before the before the Federal Reserve was founded we had a lot of gold in the United States and then there was a huge concern that the US was going to default so right around 1900ish right around in there um a lot of the gold the Europeans were taking their gold back and there was a huge concern of default well um JP went over and convinced them to bring their goal back which in and underpinned it um and and the US did not default at that time. If you look at the 1900 I forget the the two the two pe the running candidates on the Democratic party and the Republican party. The Democrats were holding up signs if you look at the you you can get video footage and they're holding up signs saying silver. They wanted more silver into the economy for the people. Republicans were saying gold gold. they wanted more gold. It's more, you know, more more at the banker level and that was the biggest problems of the time. So, and then obviously the Federal Reserve was created not too far from there. So, if we fast forward, there is a need uh for I would say it's a physical asset. One of the downsides to gold is it's expensive. It could be stolen. um is it there? And so one of the themes I've been talking about this year is jurisdiction matters. Where do you own it? Um so most of the world's gold traditionally has been held at the Bank of England in London all in one place. So you're seeing nations are asking for its gold to come back and so they're repatriating gold everywhere. Venezuela asked a number of years ago asked for their gold and they said, "Nope, you're not getting your gold." So that's in the world courts. So now you can see where people do want their assets, you know, back home. But then we start looking at the vaults in the United States. They're out of insurance. So it's a little secret that no one wants to know. So a typical facility is going to cap out around 5 to six billion in coverage. There are vaults out there, guys, that have 50 to 100 plus billion in one in one location, which means there's not dollar for-doll insurance. Most most people will get an insurance certificate says, "I have it." But in the event of a total loss there there's a problem out there. So there's a need for what I would say worldclass institutional vaults. So that's that's where you know when I when I built uh this facility out we still have more construction to go is is having private vaults that have extreme trans uh transparency third party audits. It could be visited. We've got, you know, metal detection and X-ray and armed guards and we have all the all the stuff that's even my ceiling. Every everything is concrete. It's it's and you do that for insurance. You do that for purposes. So, there's a big there's going to be a big push for geographic spreading of of the material out there just like you're seeing, you know, uh, you know, even even your password for your wallet multi-IG. Don't have them all in one location. Obviously, you guys are in the the custodial places. don't have, you know, you shouldn't keep your coins on, you know, on a um on an exchange. You're exposed to their balance sheets or whatever. You know, FTX shared a lot of that issue with us. And so I I I see it I see gold as kind of the underpinning of people's operations, uh governments, balance sheets, and then, you know, and then we're going to see, you know, Bitcoin is is clearly playing a role and it's growing. It's, you know, what Bitcoin's over two trillion now. So, it's going to continue to grow as another asset that's playing a kind of a similar role. So, I think it all dovetales. So, instead of taking Peter Schiff where I'm going to bash it, I made the choice years ago to saying, "Hey, you know what? I I like it. It has the same thesis. I can own more than one asset. I don't have to be a maximalist on something. I can still be very passionate about one or the other." and at times on certain snapshots maybe you're proven right but we we also don't have a prediction ball of of what it's going to look like in in in the future while um but you want to have exposure to the things that could potentially be really really strong >> sorry just to jump in it's so fascinating because there's two aspects everything you referenced about jurisdictional custody insurance they're like mirror BTC right like there's not enough insurance on any custodial exchange cuz they hold you know hundred you know anywhere between 20 to 100 billion in Lloyds is only going to insure up to like 250 to 500 at max. Um cuz or jurisdictional stuff matters, right? If somebody's going to seize and that's where like El Salvador put their allocation, brought it back home. And then um the point of underpinnings, it's still it's a little bit easier or it is easier to move, but it's still has the friction point of how do you actually like create uh financial infrastructure? The other thing that uh but tying into that that you said was about um what was the second part you it was um you were referencing there's the jurisdictional um oh the the diversification. So you have so you you were referencing not being a maximalist and that's actually the rational thing to do and it's an irrational so uh this ties back to security and the there was a we'll put in the show notes but it came up I think two nights ago Josh had tweeted about um the the country I guess of Molly never heard of it but they had like literally took a helicopter in Africa um and airlifted uh 32,000 ounces I think it was a ton of uh gold and this is $100 million And I think this is something that we just fully don't appreciate for Bitcoin holders in self-custody is that people don't recognize that people hold tens of millions of dollars or hundreds of millions of dollars in their homes. And when they do, if they're willing to take an helicopter to take, you know, something that's very heavy, like this is the kind of our our theme with the counterparty risk, but taking it a step further is um it makes complete sense. We see this with very sophisticated and you work with them where somebody gets overexposed because of the price appreciation or whatever reason into gold and they naturally will diversify into BTC because of its properties. In the same way OG holders that have held thousands of BTC will naturally diversify into gold because you don't want to get knocked out of the game. And that's just that's just pragmatism. That's not like ideology. So it makes complete sense to have a a portfolio especially as you get older. You can't like you're not going to go to the the bread lines if you like lose all your gold. you want, you know, god forbid something happens, you still have your Bitcoin. >> Hey, I am friends with some of like OG Bitcoin, Day One, Genesis, ETH guys, even though a lot of these people will will will say they're all, you know, a lot of people don't talk their what actually they're doing. But that's to your point, you always take something off the shelf and, you know, and and diversify a little bit. And I and you know, that could be that could be both ways. And you know that that is that's that is critical and that jurisdictional risk. I think you saw Kraken was in the news. They moved their headquarters to to Wyoming. Wyoming has the some of the best regulatory environment of of digital rights in the world and you're going to see there's going to be an announcement of someone gigantic. So Wyoming is going to be the block I can say this confidently. it will be the blockchain capital of the United States. And I think the amount of energy and capital that's coming in here um the the protection against, you know, um bankruptcy leans on for custodial uh is there's there's so much legal framework of why you're going to see more more businesses come to Wyoming. It's also that was one of the other reasons I chose here to say, "Hey, I'm I'm a classic asset guy, but I want to work with these these other groups and and just being a place where property rights this is like Wyoming's old school. it it it's like going back in time and it just doesn't want a lot of people here. So, they actually created the LLC. Delaware did a they did a much better job marketing it. Um but they copied Wyoming and I think you know you saw you know like like Lumis um you've seen Caitlyn Long here. you've seen um you know there there's been a number of lawyers that are here that have really really kind of pushed forward to say you know what we have to protect digital assets like like this like physical property is also protected in the state of Wyoming and there was a very prominent u property rights case a long time ago that went to the the it went to the Supreme Court and it talked about that if you're not allowed to build a fence um around your property to keep out trespass pastors, then you you do not have property rights. And so they've taken that same exact construct and said the same thing to digital assets. And so we're it has fencing. And so think even like something as simple as if you own a a a token on an exchange and you get an airdrop and if you're a resident of some states, you don't have a claim to get it. And if you're a resident of Wyoming, by law, they have to give that airdrop to you. So these are the things that you know we're just facing the unknown um but where you are does matter and I think that's we're going to see that um for a lot of reasons you know US has a lot of problems but it's still the best country in the world and in in my opinion and so I'm not I will while I looked at uh other places around the world for I said you know what I'm not giving up on the US it's it's uh it's going to be a rocky road ahead u but this is this is a a great place to build and it's fun it's fun to watch other people build uh as well and you know just watch it grow. I mean, who who would have thought? Yeah, I remember when Bitcoin hit 10,000 the first time. Now we're six figures, right? We're probably going to have that same look back, you know, perhaps with another digit at some point. So, you know, these are interesting times to to watch. And and frankly, the same thing on gold. People don't really understand there's ratios of debt to how much gold is out there. It's, you know, my conservative approach is it'll be 10,000 this decade. That's that's what I'll say on camera. My off camerara is much different. So, yeah, I full I fully believe it. I mean, I think um I'm not sure where you want to take the rest of the show, Jackson, but I do want to call out all of this. The the the overarching theme is there's going to be like we're in a bull market for counterparty risk, and you referenced it earlier as distrust because there's just too much debt and not enough whatever you want to call the scarce asset. There's not enough dollars to service it. there's not enough gold, there's not enough Bitcoin. So, at the end of the day, if you look at it from that lens, wherever the underlying sits is 10/10en of the law. And so, you want to make sure that you have eyes and you have it in the right place. And uh how you feel about Wyoming is how I feel about Texas. And we've adopted a lot of the stuff that Wyoming initially, the specy law around OC and the uh underlying collateral to be used for loans. And uh Texas has picked up on a lot of that. And I think that's the beauty as you're referencing of the US is there's a friendly cooperation and competition because you can naturally see that uh proliferate in the states and then that's where people's capital and you move with your feet and intellectual capital and then that's how you can start to create different frameworks versus you have to leave the country. I think historically Wyoming and Texas have been it's big brother little brother um in in the energy sector uh you know oil gas um uranium is gigantic in Wyoming um food meat beef rare earth minerals coal it's the biggest coal state so it's the second largest energy exporter behind Texas and so I I'm I'm not just predicting I know that the two states are there's synergies happening and they're in they're in the works. Um both both on the physical metal side uh but also on on the digital side because you know there there's there's states that are leaders and then there's states that are followers or they're just going to fall apart. I think you know we're seeing the state you know businesses are leaving certain states and yeah I think it's a this is going to be an interesting time you know as we go forward to say you know the it's a it's a good opportunity for the states um and it's also attracting the talent you know can is the talent there obviously Texas just just pulled in you know Elon um you know there's just huge things happening and you're seeing it in Florida too so there's a lot of exciting things I think within a to different communities that you know from talent to regulation uh and also just a will to say we want we want this type of business we want this type of thing uh you know Wyoming is doing a stable coin later this year so you know that's they'll be the first state to issue a stable coin and so and and people kind of go well why and I can tell you why there's a distrust of the other products that are out there and so if if you know residents of of whatever community need need options and so that'll that'll be interesting uh as as we go as we go forward. >> Totally agree. Josh, I know we just have a couple more minutes here. Um we we got to jump to another call, but I I did want to just get your thoughts really quickly on institutional investor interest. So from what I've gathered on this call so far, it's almost a barbell in terms of you have at the highest level sovereign central banks that are doing business with you understand counterparty risk one physical metals in their jurisdictions or want to store it in Wyoming for the reasons you described and then you have I would assume like kind of high net worth ultra high net worth individuals. But you also made a point earlier that I thought was interesting because I saw this when I worked in the traditional finance space is that wealth management, family offices, institutional investors have largely ignored gold. It was never really like a core portion of portfolio allocation. Um, you know, it was like maybe if you have a bearish or bullish view on a certain thing, you have like a 1% or 2% allocation. I imagine that's going to change dramatically in the next five years. And I'm curious if like you're starting to see that at all already. >> Uh, w with without a doubt we're seeing that. That's a that's a really good point. And even even this move that we're seeing in the last two years, the retail public is still asleep. I'd say some family offices are waking up. Uh some some have had held gold in Switzerland uh in in the past. A lot of that gold's coming to the US. So we're working with with those types of groups. Uh the reason I created the Wyoming Reserve wasn't was as as a as a stock offering that's being offered. So we're FINRA SEC. we're being offered through the broker dealer community is because there's very little optionality. And you know, buying physical metal for those that understand it, it's very simple, but it's kind of like it's kind of like buying Bitcoin for the first time. It can be a little it can be a little daunting unless someone's walking you through it. So, how do we make products easier? So, that that that that company's really intended for high net worth. And so, we're seeing it or they want they want the upside of of a company. So it's essentially a hybrid between what strategy does and what an ETF does. We're we're we're a we're a C corp with tax advantages that makes that holds 90% of its physical ass it balance sheet in physical metals and we're mark to market every day. We strike a new stock price each quarter and then we can go up to 10% in digital asset. And so we've got a mechanical strategy of, you know, when when we're holding Bitcoin, uh, and the idea is that that we're holding pristine assets and then we're also a business that can make business income off of those off of those assets, whether it be third party vaulting, uh, metal turn, uh, etc. So that is really intended for, it's intended for the future. And, and we saw in the big beautiful bill, they just made Oz's permanent, which is like I'm like, oh my gosh. So almost every OZ fund out there is real estate. It's not possible. And and and based on the the rules, you can't you couldn't have 100% digital company in in and have the opportunity zone benefits. So, you know, I see that growing um that the the demand is going to grow because it's always been stocks and bonds at whatever ratio and bonds have been complete trash. So for for quite some time they're just and they're they're and doesn't look great. um for a long >> you the last the last time we chat I know we have to jump but the last time we chatted it was the most fascinating um you know capital formation I saw with your firm I think uh folks should reach out look into it and then uh the other thing that you said uh jewelry I'm assuming something closer like I don't think a lot of people know about Menet but um I I tell the guys I joke around I have Menet just on me because if I ever get stuck in a country I have you know some some cash that's not cash and I would imagine there's something similar and that's such a great margin because they get to mark it up like 30 to 40% and then uh send it back and and but not they're not widely known. I would imagine you have some dro for that. >> Yeah. Our our jewel would be a little different. So we we create so much metal scrap here just producing the bullion product that the big jewelry companies are that have to tell their shareholders their ESG compliant recycled goods. They are clamoring for us to produce things for them. So, um, we'll probably do, you know, traditional jewelry, the investment jewelry. Uh, we'll be doing silverware, uh, that but stuff that looks good in your home today. Maybe it's art deco or, you know, has has a new a new vibe that doesn't look like grandma. So, really, at the end of the day, we're we we hold the metal, we move the metal, uh, it's audited. Um, we supply governments, people. We have a a division that sells on eBay, Walmart.com, uh, you know, all sorts of places. And then we supply, you know, hundreds of wholesalers all around the world. So, really, we're we're in the business and there's just spokes on the wheel and yeah, times are times are changing quickly, so it's going to be interesting decade ahead. >> Awesome, Josh. Well, pleasure to meet you today. Appreciate the time. Where do you want to send people that want to get in touch with you? >> Yeah. Um, check me out on X. Josh Phillip Fair. Um, I'm on X. Uh, the two companies I mentioned, Scottsdale Mint is the manufacturing company. If you want to go to the Wyoming Reserve.com, um, if you're an accredited investor and interested in the next offering or just just checking out what it is, uh, we'll be announcing that here in a few weeks. So, those are >> Yeah, follow Josh. He he's a great follow. He had some awesome stuff about six months ago tracking where all this gold was moving around. So, appreciate you joining, Josh, and look forward to catching up again. >> Thanks, guys. Thanks, everyone. >> Thank you, Josh. >> Thanks, Josh. >> Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the show. 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