Trump Euphoria, Bitcoin and Gold

“My hope for bitcoin is that it can improve the efficiency of the information system that we call ‘money.’”

– Elon Musk, appointed to the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

November 13, 2024—On the Friday before the election, we recommend that you hedge the results of the impending vote with Bitcoin and Gold.

Since Wednesday’s opening, bitcoin has soared 22%… shooting to $92,600 this morning.

Turn Your Images On

The bellwether crypto is up over 150% over the past year. And it’s getting a serious huff of Trump Trade fumes.

Trump’s campaign promise, among many disruptive ones, includes replacing Gary Gensler, the existing SEC chair who was slowly noodling over regulatory changes for crypto.

We speculated all year that backroom deal-making was being organized to support the Fed coin and a new era of highly regulated (manipulated) CBDC coins.

The election results put an end to that fear with some earnest abandon.

Another puff of fumes fueling the Trump pipe dream came yesterday in the form of another campaign promise coming into focus: The “Department of Government Efficiency’ – or DOGE after the crypto coin Elon Musk owns and often discusses.

Musk and entrepreneur-turned-presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy will head up the new de-government task, which has a mission—a mandate, rather—to make forceful suggestions on how to remove $2 trillion of wasteful spending from the Deep State bureaucracy.

During this euphoric phase of the so-called Trump Trade, the market doesn’t need a lot of fumes to get high.

Gold hasn’t fared as well. In fact, it’s down nearly $200 (priced in dollars) since its historic high of $2,800 on October 30.

Yep.

But you’re wrong if you think we’re going to apologize for gold. Our friend Dominic Frisby takes a quick review of both alternatives to the U.S. Dollar below. Enjoy – Addison

Bitcoin’s Looking Great. Gold Not So Much.

Dominic Frisby, The Flying Frisby

Today, we are going to look at gold, bitcoin, and our way of playing it.

Let’s start with gold.

Gold – and most other metals – has been hit since the U.S. election last week. It’s down $200, or about 7%, with U.S. dollar strength being a big factor (the dollar has been storming higher since October).

While I think this bull market might be punctured, as I put it last week, and that gold probably has a bit further to fall, I am not unduly worried. 2024 has hitherto been a great year for gold, and it remains an essential long-term core holding.

It is an even more essential holding for UK investors. I think sterling has big problems ahead of it, and gold serves as your hedge against crap governments.

Labour or Tory – I’m no fan of either.

They’re both as bad as each other, in my view. The less government there is, the better things run. But that’s irrelevant idealism. Of greater concern here is reality: there has never been a Labour Government that did not devalue sterlin

Blair and Brown crashed sterling in 2007-8 (though until then their record was okay);
Under Wilson, Callaghan, and Healey, we ended up going to the IMF in 1976. Callaghan and Wilson also devalued in 1967.
Cripps and Attlee devalued in 1949.
Ramsay MacDonald’s National Government, which followed Labour from 1929-31, took us off the gold standard in 1931.

Why should this Labour Government be any different? If anything, it is even less competent. Sterling devaluation is coming.

How exactly might not yet be clear. I rather suspect it’ll be an attempt to make us competitive against an ultra-streamlined U.S., but that’s just a guess. You must own some gold (and some bitcoin) in such an environment: non-government money. ~~ Dominic Frisby, The Flying Frisby

Regards,

Addison Wiggin,
Grey Swan

P.S. Just as there has never been a Labour government that hasn’t devalued the British Pound… so there has never been a Republican or Democratic administration in modern times that didn’t devalue the dollar, whether through foreign exchange or a massive run-up in debt and inflation.

Bitcoin enthusiasts point out that cryptocurrency has no “top” price because fiat currencies have no bottom. Gold, to a lesser extent, also fits into that scarcity mold.

That’s why we view both assets performing well throughout Trump’s second term.

Or, as Grey Swan reader Marcus suggested last week:

“Things will go well in 2025 if (and this is a big IF) Elon Musk is successful at cutting the $2 trillion from our government expenditures as he anticipated.

“If that happens, it will reduce the pressure on our government to borrow money to pay our debts. This will set into motion a domino effect of positive results.”

Send your thoughts to: addison@greyswanfraternity.com.

“My hope for bitcoin is that it can improve the efficiency of the information system that we call ‘money.’”

– Elon Musk, appointed to the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

November 13, 2024—On the Friday before the election, we recommend that you hedge the results of the impending vote with Bitcoin and Gold.

Since Wednesday’s opening, bitcoin has soared 22%… shooting to $92,600 this morning.

Turn Your Images On

The bellwether crypto is up over 150% over the past year. And it’s getting a serious huff of Trump Trade fumes.

Trump’s campaign promise, among many disruptive ones, includes replacing Gary Gensler, the existing SEC chair who was slowly noodling over regulatory changes for crypto.

We speculated all year that backroom deal-making was being organized to support the Fed coin and a new era of highly regulated (manipulated) CBDC coins.

The election results put an end to that fear with some earnest abandon.

During this euphoric phase of the so-called Trump Trade, the market doesn’t need a lot of fumes to get high.

Gold hasn’t fared as well. In fact, it’s down nearly $200 (priced in dollars) since its historic high of $2,800 on October 30.

Yep.

But you’re wrong if you think we’re going to apologize for gold. Our friend Dominic Frisby takes a quick review of both alternatives to the U.S. Dollar below. Enjoy – Addison

Bitcoin’s Looking Great. Gold Not So Much.

Dominic Frisby, The Flying Frisby

Today, we are going to look at gold, bitcoin, and our way of playing it.

Let’s start with gold.

It is an even more essential holding for UK investors. I think sterling has big problems ahead of it, and gold serves as your hedge against crap governments.

Labour or Tory – I’m no fan of either.

Blair and Brown crashed sterling in 2007-8 (though until then their record was okay);
Under Wilson, Callaghan, and Healey, we ended up going to the IMF in 1976. Callaghan and Wilson also devalued in 1967.
Cripps and Attlee devalued in 1949.
Ramsay MacDonald’s National Government, which followed Labour from 1929-31, took us off the gold standard in 1931.

Why should this Labour Government be any different? If anything, it is even less competent. Sterling devaluation is coming.

Regards,

Addison Wiggin,
Grey Swan

Bitcoin enthusiasts point out that cryptocurrency has no “top” price because fiat currencies have no bottom. Gold, to a lesser extent, also fits into that scarcity mold.

That’s why we view both assets performing well throughout Trump’s second term.

Or, as Grey Swan reader Marcus suggested last week:

“Things will go well in 2025 if (and this is a big IF) Elon Musk is successful at cutting the $2 trillion from our government expenditures as he anticipated.

“If that happens, it will reduce the pressure on our government to borrow money to pay our debts. This will set into motion a domino effect of positive results.”

Send your thoughts to: addison@greyswanfraternity.com.

Our forecast will feel obvious in hindsight and controversial in advance — the hallmark of a Grey Swan.

Most analysts we speak to are thinking in terms of the history of Western conflict.

They expect full-frontal military engagement.

Beijing, from our modest perch, prefers resolution because resolution compounds its power. Why sacrifice the workshop of the world, when cajoling and bribery will do?

Taiwan will not fall.

It will merge.

Wars, technology races, and political upheavals — all of them rest on fiscal capacity.

In 2026, that capacity will tighten across the developed world simultaneously. Democracies will discover that generosity financed by debt carries conditions, whether voters approve of them or not.

Bond markets will not shout so much as clear their throats. Repeatedly.

Taken together, the seven Grey Swans of 2025 behaved less like isolated events and more like interlocking stories readers already recognize.

The year moved in phases. A sharp April selloff cleared leverage quickly. Policy shifted toward tax relief, lighter regulation, and renewed tolerance for liquidity. Innovations began to slowly dominate the marketplace conversation – from Dollar 2.0 digital assets to AI-powered applications in all manner of commercial enterprises, ranging from airline and hotel bookings to driverless taxis and robots.

Back in April, when we published what we called the Trump Great Reset Strategy, we described the grand realignment we believed President Trump and his acolytes were embarking on in three phases.

At the time, it read like a conceptual map. As the months passed, it began to feel like a set of operating instructions written in advance of turbulence.

As you can expect, any grandiose plan would get all kinds of blowback… but this year exhibited all manner of Trump Derangement Syndrome on top of the difficulty of steering a sclerotic empire clear of the rocky shores.

The “phases” were never about optimism or pessimism. They were about sequencing — how stress surfaces, how systems adapt, and what must hold before confidence can regenerate. And in the end, what do we do with our money?!

Our forecast will feel obvious in hindsight and controversial in advance — the hallmark of a Grey Swan.

Most analysts we speak to are thinking in terms of the history of Western conflict.

They expect full-frontal military engagement.

Beijing, from our modest perch, prefers resolution because resolution compounds its power. Why sacrifice the workshop of the world, when cajoling and bribery will do?

Taiwan will not fall.

It will merge.

Wars, technology races, and political upheavals — all of them rest on fiscal capacity.

In 2026, that capacity will tighten across the developed world simultaneously. Democracies will discover that generosity financed by debt carries conditions, whether voters approve of them or not.

Bond markets will not shout so much as clear their throats. Repeatedly.

Taken together, the seven Grey Swans of 2025 behaved less like isolated events and more like interlocking stories readers already recognize.

Back in April, when we published what we called the Trump Great Reset Strategy, we described the grand realignment we believed President Trump and his acolytes were embarking on in three phases.

At the time, it read like a conceptual map. As the months passed, it began to feel like a set of operating instructions written in advance of turbulence.