Bitcoin's success is "disgusting"… That’s what Charlie Munger told folks on Saturday at the annual shareholder meeting of Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A). It’s the $640 billion investing conglomerate he runs along with the world’s most celebrated investor, Warren Buffett. Buffett is also a bitcoin hater. He’s repeatedly attacked it over the years. Most famously, in 2018, he called it “rat poison squared.” But over the weekend, Munger topped that level of vitriol. When asked about bitcoin’s now $2 trillion market cap, he fired back… Of course I hate the bitcoin success. And I don’t welcome a currency that’s so useful to kidnappers and extortionists and so forth. Nor do I like shuffling out a few extra billions and billions of dollars to somebody who just invented a new financial product out of thin air. I think I should say modestly that I think the whole damn development is disgusting and contrary to the interests of civilization. Today, I (Chris Lowe) will show you why Munger and Buffett are wrong on bitcoin… and why a lot of their criticism of the crypto is just sour grapes. Despite what they say, bitcoin is still one of the top moneymaking opportunities in the world right now. Let’s start with the blindingly obvious… Criminals have long used banks and large-domination banknotes to store their ill-gotten gains. Take Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. In the late 1980s, at the peak of his blood-soaked career, Forbes ranked him as the seventh-richest person in the world. It’s easy to see why. Over the decade, Escobar’s cartel supplied about 80% of the global supply of cocaine. By one estimate, his drug smuggling operation brought in as much as $60 million a day. How did Escobar store this vast wealth? Colombian banks refused to touch him. So he stashed some of his gains in Swiss bank accounts. But he stored far more of his wealth in huge stacks of $100 bills. He shrink-wrapped them and buried them in plastic barrels or metal boxes. According to a report in British newspaper The Daily Mirror, this led to one-fifth of all $100 bills in existence being buried in Colombia. Did this criminal use of U.S. dollars stop Buffett and Munger from using the currency? Did they speak out against the government-issued cash? Of course not. They continued to earn and spend U.S. dollars even though it was the go-to currency of one of the world’s most murderous criminals. Criminals also use cars to get away from banks they’ve robbed, private jets to smuggle drugs, and cell phones to coordinate their crimes. But no serious person goes on a tirade against cars, private jets, or cell phones. Heck, one of the technologies kidnappers use most often is duct tape. But you can still buy duct tape at any hardware store. We get that these things may be valuable to bad actors. But we also see them as valuable to the rest of society. | Recommended Link | | Looking for Answers? Do This… Bloomberg is calling it a “bona fide bubble.” And MarketWatch says the stock market looks like “Wile E. Coyote, running off the edge of a cliff…” If you believe them, it could cost you dearly… According to master trader Jeff Clark… Last year, 2,887 stocks soared 100% or more… Showing you nearly 3,000 chances to double your money – more than 50 times per week on average! And this year could be even BIGGER. If you’re looking for answers, click the button below. | | | -- | Only a tiny fraction of crypto payments have been linked to crime… Looks as though Munger didn’t research this much. If he did, he wouldn’t have gotten in such a twist about kidnappers and extortionists. Chainalysis is a leading blockchain analysis firm. Each year, it releases a Crypto Crime Report. And for 2020, it reported that the criminal share of all cryptocurrency transactions was just 0.34%. That’s roughly $10 billion in transaction volume. And about half that illicit activity was related to crypto scams… not drug smuggling or violent crimes. Traditional finance is much more popular with criminals… Take it from Jennifer Fowler. From 2013 to 2018, she was Deputy Assistant Secretary at the Office of Terrorist Financing and Financial Crimes at the U.S. Department of the Treasury. If anyone has a handle on the use of bitcoin and other cryptos for illicit purposes, it’s Fowler. Up 5X More Than Bitcoin… But in 2017, she told the Senate Judiciary Committee the currency of choice for bad guys was the U.S. dollar. Fowler… Although virtual currencies are used for illicit transactions, the volume is small compared to the volume of illicit activity through traditional financial services. How much smaller is the volume of illicit activity in crypto versus mainstream financial services? One way of measuring this looks at bitcoins spent on the dark web. This corner of the internet consists of networks criminals and hackers choose because of the anonymity it affords them. The United Nations Drugs and Crime Office and Chainalysis say that for every dollar spent in bitcoin on the dark web, at least $800 was laundered via good, old-fashioned government cash. Bitcoin just isn’t a great choice for criminals… That’s because it’s not anonymous, like physical cash. All bitcoin transactions are stored on the bitcoin blockchain. It’s a database that contains all past bitcoin transactions. And it’s open for the public to see. With the help of blockchain forensics, it’s relatively easy for law enforcement to catch folks who use bitcoin for illegal activities. Here’s how colleague and world-renowned crypto investing expert Teeka Tiwari explained it to me… One thing that makes bitcoin different from the banking system is it makes it possible to send and receive bitcoins pseudonymously. But it’s relatively easy for an outfit such as the FBI to trace those transactions back to you. I’ve sat down with federal prosecutors at cryptocurrency events. They’ve confided in me and said, “Look, we think bitcoin’s amazing. Anyone who’s dumb enough to use it to commit crimes is making our lives so much easier.” Like with anything, you’ve got to look behind the sensational headlines and at the underlying technology. When you do that, you quickly realize bitcoin is not good for what criminals want to do. So Munger’s comments over the weekend are not just logically flawed. They’re also way off base. | Recommended Link | | Controversial. Incredible! And they call this journalism! Do you think an outfit like The Wall Street Journal should cover an explosive stock like Synthorx, that goes up 432% in 6 weeks? You do? Why then, does The Wall Street Journal have 7.5 MILLION news items on Facebook… but ONLY 8 on Synthorx?? It boggles the mind! (Worse, only ONE of those mentions was made before the stock rose. When you could have actually done something about it!) Legendary tech investor Jeff Brown DID recommend Synthorx… And 24 people wrote in to say they collected $532,000 (in total) on this one stock alone. Now he's doing it again… He's found 3 other stocks like Synthorx that the mainstream media is completely IGNORING right now… These are screaming buys. And one in particular could spike up any day… by 400–1,000%. | | | -- | I don’t have any interest in dunking on Munger or Buffett… They have impressive long-term track records in traditional financial markets. Over the 56 years since Buffett took over Berkshire Hathaway, its shareholders have enjoyed a compounded annual gain of 20%. That’s double the gain of the S&P 500, including dividends. And although Munger is best known as Buffett’s right-hand man, from 1962 to 1975, he ran his own investment partnership. Over that time, it generated compound annual returns of 19.8%. That compares with a 5.1% growth rate for the S&P 500, including dividends. These returns don’t mean Munger and Buffett don’t have blind spots – especially when it comes to new technologies. The duo missed out on huge gains in internet stocks… In 2017, Buffett told CNBC’s Squawk Box they made a mistake passing on Google (GOOG) shares before the company went public in 2004. “That’s cost people a lot of money at Berkshire,” he admitted. He also conceded that he should have invested in another tech stock, Amazon.com (AMZN). “I was too dumb to realize,” he told CNBC. “I did not think [Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos] could succeed on the scale he has.” He even admitted he and Munger “miss a lot of things, and we’ll keep doing it.” Too bad they don’t apply that thinking to their big miss on bitcoin. Over the past 12 months, bitcoin is up 544%. That’s more than 10x the 53% rise in Berkshire Hathaway’s share price over the same period. Don’t be shaken out of bitcoin by Munger’s hyperventilating… Neither he nor Buffett has any expertise in bitcoin. As I mentioned up top, there’s an element of sour grapes here. As two stock market investors, Munger and Buffett don’t love that roughly $2 trillion in investor capital has wound up in crypto and not in stocks. Keep your focus on the big picture instead. And tune in to someone who’s been right about bitcoin, not someone who’s been wrong about it. As regular readers will know, Teeka first recommended bitcoin in April 2016 at $428 a coin. And he’s been bullish on it ever since – including through every big dip along the way. At today’s price of $57,864, that’s a 13,420% gain for readers who acted on his initial recommendation. That's enough to turn every $1,000 investment into $135,200. And as Teeka has been pounding the drum on, those gains aren’t over. As he explained in more detail here, he sees bitcoin going up 10x from here… and other cryptos doing even better. In the mailbag: “Almost everything you predicted about the crypto market has come true”… If you’re not already following Teeka’s research and ideas, you’re missing out. Big T – as he’s known to his readers – is one of the world’s most closely followed crypto investing experts. His Palm Beach Confidential was the first major financial newsletter focused solely on crypto. As I said, Teeka has given subscribers a chance to turn every $1,000 into $135,200 on bitcoin. Here’s a selection of recent thank-you messages from his readers… Your guidance continues to be a source of hope and confidence to me and my wife. In the last three years, I have seen almost everything you predicted about the crypto market come true, and watched our portfolio grow tremendously. Following your guidelines of taking multiple small positions and adding to the positions gradually when we had free capital, we have watched our overall portfolio go up 10x. I cannot express how grateful I am for your guidance, expertise, and mentorship. Since 2018, there have been a lot of ups and downs. But the results have been amazing, and I know we are not even at the finish line yet. You have given us a gift that cannot easily be repaid. – Andrew B. I wanted to say a big thank you. In 2019 I lost my well-paid job in finance. I have not been able to get back to work yet. Amazingly, in the year off following the crypto bull run, my net worth skyrocketed from the crypto holdings I purchased based on your recommendations. – Daniel E. I subscribed in late 2017 and got in on the tail end of the bull market. For a short time, I was elated by the gains. Then came the bear market. My portfolio went underwater for a long time. But I stuck to it and kept listening to Big T’s sincere conviction. Now I’m up more than 5x overall in my portfolio. I could cash out and retire comfortably, but I’m with Big T… Why would I pull my money from an asset class I think is going to be the best performer in my portfolio in the near term? Also, I got my kids into crypto. I have already gifted them coins, so they have a great start. Big T, you have my respect, admiration, and sincere thanks. Keep up the great work. – David B. I started with your Palm Beach Confidential service in May 2020. I invested £90,000, which has grown to £400,000 in less than a year. A million thanks to you. You have changed my life. I am now going to try your Alpha Edge advisory. – Anne J. I was totally overwhelmed by all the ideas, methods, and promises in the many newsletters to which I kept subscribing. Out of the confusion, your voice kept outlining simple methods to help keep me solvent in retirement, and even thrive! Thank you, Teeka and team, for putting me on a much happier path. It’s a whole new world for me. – Anne W. Your sage advice helps us hold on through crypto volatility. Someday I’d love to meet you, shake your hand, and say, “Thank you, Big T. You made a huge difference in my life.” I’ll never forget you, and what you helped me achieve for my family. – Robert R. I am with you 100%! So many newbies are freaking out over small dips. I have been in since 2017. I experienced the horrible crypto winter and watched my bitcoin drop as much as 87%. I listened to you and never sold any. Now I am up 8x on bitcoin alone, not to mention way higher gains on some of the altcoins you’ve recommended. You are an amazing man! I can’t tell you how much I enjoy watching your videos. – Richard M. Has Teeka’s advice helped you move the needle on your wealth? Let us know at feedback@legacyresearch.com. Regards, Chris Lowe
May 3, 2021
Barcelona, Spain Like what you’re reading? Send your thoughts to feedback@legacyresearch.com. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT… WARNING: New Rule to Impact 1,200 Banks in America Please take one minute to review this URGENT letter from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). The OCC is the agency that regulates about 1,200 banks in the U.S. And it just issued a letter announcing a major change to our banking system that could impact 234 million Americans. If you have any money in the bank… Please click here right now and see how this could impact you. 
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