Connect with us

Business

Central banks will end up holding Bitcoin in their reserves even though it is ‘backed by nothing,’ Deutsche Bank predicts

Published

on


The price of Bitcoin briefly topped $125,000 yesterday, a new record high. And as its price goes up, its relative volatility declines, a new analysis by Deutsche Bank argues. That factor is making Bitcoin more like gold—an asset that has a fixed supply and a low price correlation with other assets.

And that in turn increasingly makes Bitcoin a candidate to be added to central bank reserve assets, according to Deutche analysts Marion Laboure and Camilla Siazon.

“A strategic Bitcoin allocation could emerge as a modern cornerstone of financial security, echoing gold’s role in the 20th century. Assessing volatility, liquidity, strategic value and trust, we find that both assets will likely feature on central bank balance sheets by 2030,” they said in a research slide deck Tuesday. 

Their argument is based on the fact that gold (a common central bank asset) and Bitcoin have both risen precipitously in price over the last few years. They produced this chart. (Note the differing vertical axes, which are flattering to the price of gold):

There’s another factor favoring Bitcoin right now: Companies that have created “Bitcoin treasuries” on their balance sheet. Hundreds of companies now count Bitcoin as an asset, most famously Michael Saylor’s Strategy, whose entire strategy is to buy more Bitcoin.

Gold is going up because central banks are steadily buying it has a hedge against political uncertainty in the U.S. and the weakening dollar. Central banks worldwide usually hold U.S. dollars in their reserves, and while that continues to be the case, many nations have chosen to add gold to diversify their assets.

Marion Laboure and Camilla Siazon’s theory is that as Bitcoin behaves more like gold, and as central banks seek assets that don’t move in tandem with other assets, they’ll be tempted to add crypto.

There is, of course, one catch. Technically, Bitcoin is not an asset. It’s merely a piece of computer code signalling a price. Unlike cash, bonds, property or stocks, Bitcoin does not entitle the owner to any underlying asset, interest, or cash flow.

“The main counter-argument is that Bitcoin – backed by nothing – is too volatile for long-term value,” Laboure and Siazon admit. “Yet, its volatility has now fallen to historic lows.”  

The price of gold—as measured by the Comex continuous contract market—sits at $3,983.80 per troy ounce this morning, a whisker below $4,000. Goldman Sachs expects it to go higher. Goldman analysts Lina Thomas and Daan Struyven raised their target price for gold to $4,900, up from their previous estimate of $4,300 because of “sticky” demand.

A big driver of that demand is emerging market central banks, they told clients. “EM central banks are likely to continue the structural diversification of their reserves into gold (contributing 19pp to the 23% price increase we expect by [December 2026]),” they said. 

Gold prices have now risen more than 50% this year. That’s the kind of rise you’d normally see in a crisis, according to Jim Reid and his team at Deutsche Bank. They told clients Tuesday morning that markets haven’t seen prices rise like that for more than 40 years. It was “their fastest annual gain since 1979, when they rose +127% amidst a surge in inflation after the oil crisis that year,” they wrote.

And yet the stock markets aren’t behaving as if there is a crisis. The S&P 500 hit a new record high yesterday. It’s up 14.6% year-to-date.

That’s the central, weird theme of the markets right now: Investors are optimistic about stocks at the same time as they’re piling into “safe haven” assets like gold and—if you buy Deutsche Bank’s argument—Bitcoin.

Here’s a snapshot of the markets ahead of the opening bell in New York this morning:

  • S&P 500 futures were flat this morning. The index closed up 0.36% in its last session at a new high of 6,740.28.
  • STOXX Europe 600 was up 0.15% in early trading. 
  • The U.K.’s FTSE 100 was up 0.15% in early trading. 
  • Japan’s Nikkei 225 was flat.
  • China’s CSI 300 was up 0.45%. 
  • The South Korea KOSPI was up 2.7%. 
  • India’s Nifty 50 was up 0.54% before the end of the session. 
  • Bitcoin was flat at around $123.8K.
Fortune Global Forum returns Oct. 26–27, 2025 in Riyadh. CEOs and global leaders will gather for a dynamic, invitation-only event shaping the future of business. Apply for an invitation.



Source link

Continue Reading

Business

National Park Service drops free admission on MLK Day and Juneteenth while adding Trump’s birthday

Published

on



The National Park Service will offer free admission to U.S. residents on President Donald Trump’s birthday next year — which also happens to be Flag Day — but is eliminating the benefit for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth.

The new list of free admission days for Americans is the latest example of the Trump administration downplaying America’s civil rights history while also promoting the president’s image, name and legacy.

Last year, the list of free days included Martin Luther King Jr Day and Juneteenth — which is June 19 — but not June 14, Trump’s birthday.

The new free-admission policy takes effect Jan. 1 and was one of several changes announced by the Park Service late last month, including higher admission fees for international visitors.

The other days of free park admission in 2026 are Presidents Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Constitution Day, Veterans Day, President Theodore Roosevelt’s birthday (Oct. 27) and the anniversary of the creation of the Park Service (Aug. 25).

Eliminating Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth, which commemorates the day in 1865 when the last enslaved Americans were emancipated, removes two of the nation’s most prominent civil rights holidays.

Some civil rights leaders voiced opposition to the change after news about it began spreading over the weekend.

“The raw & rank racism here stinks to high heaven,” Harvard Kennedy School professor Cornell William Brooks, a former president of the NAACP, wrote on social media about the new policy.

Kristen Brengel, a spokesperson for the National Parks Conservation Association, said that while presidential administrations have tweaked the free days in the past, the elimination of Martin Luther King Jr. Day is particularly concerning. For one, the day has become a popular day of service for community groups that use the free day to perform volunteer projects at parks.

That will now be much more expensive, said Brengel, whose organization is a nonprofit that advocates for the park system.

“Not only does it recognize an American hero, it’s also a day when people go into parks to clean them up,” Brengel said. “Martin Luther King Jr. deserves a day of recognition … For some reason, Black history has repeatedly been targeted by this administration, and it shouldn’t be.”

Some Democratic lawmakers also weighed in to object to the new policy.

“The President didn’t just add his own birthday to the list, he removed both of these holidays that mark Black Americans’ struggle for civil rights and freedom,” said Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada. “Our country deserves better.”

A spokesperson for the National Park Service did not immediately respond to questions on Saturday seeking information about the reasons behind the changes.

Since taking office, Trump has sought to eliminate programs seen as promoting diversity across the federal government, actions that have erased or downplayed America’s history of racism as well as the civil rights victories of Black Americans.

Self-promotion is an old habit of the president’s and one he has continued in his second term. He unsuccessfully put himself forwardfor the Nobel Peace Prize, renamed the U.S. Institute of Peace after himself, sought to put his name on the planned NFL stadium in the nation’s capital and had a new children’s savings program named after him.

Some Republican lawmakers have suggested putting his visage on Mount Rushmore and the $100 bill.



Source link

Continue Reading

Business

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon says Europe has a ‘real problem’

Published

on



JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon called out slow bureaucracy in Europe in a warning that a “weak” continent poses a major economic risk to the US.

“Europe has a real problem,” Dimon said Saturday at the Reagan National Defense Forum. “They do some wonderful things on their safety nets. But they’ve driven business out, they’ve driven investment out, they’ve driven innovation out. It’s kind of coming back.”

While he praised some European leaders who he said were aware of the issues, he cautioned politics is “really hard.” 

Dimon, leader of the biggest US bank, has long said that the risk of a fragmented Europe is among the major challenges facing the world. In his letter to shareholders released earlier this year, he said that Europe has “some serious issues to fix.”

On Saturday, he praised the creation of the euro and Europe’s push for peace. But he warned that a reduction in military efforts and challenges trying to reach agreement within the European Union are threatening the continent.

“If they fragment, then you can say that America first will not be around anymore,” Dimon said. “It will hurt us more than anybody else because they are a major ally in every single way, including common values, which are really important.”

He said the US should help.

“We need a long-term strategy to help them become strong,” Dimon said. “A weak Europe is bad for us.”

The administration of President Donald Trump issued a new national security strategy that directed US interests toward the Western Hemisphere and protection of the homeland while dismissing Europe as a continent headed toward “civilizational erasure.”

Read More: Trump’s National Security Strategy Veers Inward in Telling Shift

JPMorgan has been ramping up its push to spur more investments in the national defense sector. In October, the bank announced that it would funnel $1.5 trillion into industries that bolster US economic security and resiliency over the next 10 years — as much as $500 billion more than what it would’ve provided anyway. 

Dimon said in the statement that it’s “painfully clear that the United States has allowed itself to become too reliant on unreliable sources of critical minerals, products and manufacturing.”

Investment banker Jay Horine oversees the effort, which Dimon called “100% commercial.” It will focus on four areas: supply chain and advanced manufacturing; defense and aerospace; energy independence and resilience; and frontier and strategic technologies. 

The bank will also invest as much as $10 billion of its own capital to help certain companies expand, innovate or accelerate strategic manufacturing.

Separately on Saturday, Dimon praised Trump for finding ways to roll back bureaucracy in the government.

“There is no question that this administration is trying to bring an axe to some of the bureaucracy that held back America,” Dimon said. “That is a good thing and we can do it and still keep the world safe, for safe food and safe banks and all the stuff like that.”



Source link

Continue Reading

Business

Hegseth likens strikes on alleged drug boats to post-9/11 war on terror

Published

on



Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth defended strikes on alleged drug cartel boats during remarks Saturday at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, saying President Donald Trump has the power to take military action “as he sees fit” to defend the nation.

Hegseth dismissed criticism of the strikes, which have killed more than 80 people and now face intense scrutiny over concerns that they violated international law. Saying the strikes are justified to protect Americans, Hegseth likened the fight to the war on terror following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

“If you’re working for a designated terrorist organization and you bring drugs to this country in a boat, we will find you and we will sink you. Let there be no doubt about it,” Hegseth said during his keynote address at the Reagan National Defense Forum. “President Trump can and will take decisive military action as he sees fit to defend our nation’s interests. Let no country on earth doubt that for a moment.”

The most recent strike brings the death toll of the campaign to at least 87 people. Lawmakers have sought more answers about the attacks and their legal justification, and whether U.S. forces were ordered to launch a follow-up strike following a September attack even after the Pentagon knew of survivors.

Though Hegseth compared the alleged drug smugglers to Al-Qaida terrorists, experts have noted significant differences between the two foes and the efforts to combat them.

Hegseth’s remarks came after the Trump administration released its new national security strategy, one that paints European allies as weak and aims to reassert America’s dominance in the Western Hemisphere.

During the speech, Hegseth also discussed the need to check China’s rise through strength instead of conflict. He repeated Trump’s vow to resume nuclear testing on an equal basis as China and Russia — a goal that has alarmed many nuclear arms experts. China and Russia haven’t conducted explosive tests in decades, though the Kremlin said it would follow the U.S. if Trump restarted tests.

The speech was delivered at the Reagan National Defense Forum at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute in California, an event which brings together top national security experts from around the country. Hegseth used the visit to argue that Trump is Reagan’s “true and rightful heir” when it comes to muscular foreign policy.

By contrast, Hegseth criticized Republican leaders in the years since Reagan for supporting wars in the Middle East and democracy-building efforts that didn’t work. He also blasted those who have argued that climate change poses serious challenges to military readiness.

“The war department will not be distracted by democracy building, interventionism, undefined wars, regime change, climate change, woke moralizing and feckless nation building,” he said.



Source link

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © Miami Select.