Schiff vs. Ammous: Tokenized Gold Trumps Bitcoin

Peter recently debated longtime Bitcoin proponent Saifedean Ammous to turn the usual Bitcoin-vs.-gold argument on its head. Rather than rehashing the old debate, he focuses on tokenized gold—specifically Tether Gold— and explains why a claim on real metal is a far better monetary proposition than a claim on nothing. He argues tokenized gold brings convenience to a historically sound store of value while Bitcoin rests entirely on speculative demand.

He opens by changing the frame of the conversation and naming his real target for scrutiny:

It’s nice to have an unbiased moderator for a change show. Anyway, I’m going to change it up just a little bit because I don’t really want to have a Bitcoin gold debate. I’ve done plenty of those. I want to have the Bitcoin Tether Gold debate. So I’m going to be talking about Tether Gold because Tether Gold is tokenized gold and Bitcoin is tokenized nothing.

Next he lays out his central critique of Bitcoin’s economics: there is no underlying user demand, only speculation, so the asset has no floor and could collapse if sentiment turns: