Finding Real Value in the Crypto World

Seeking someone with the X-factor... Into bitcoin from the beginning... Finding real value in the crypto world... Comparing the Internet timeline... Looking for treasures in the jungle... Everyone, it seems, is getting in... The most critical crypto event of the year...

We needed a quant jock who could write, but who also had the 'X-factor'...

In early 2018, the investment research company that I (Kim Iskyan) founded in Singapore in collaboration with Stansberry Research was looking for an analyst experienced in cryptocurrencies.

At the time, crypto had started to take off from its early stages. The boom naturally brought out a fair share of charlatans... People who had done nothing more than buy bitcoin started branding themselves as cryptocurrency experts.

I knew our subscribers deserved someone who was a true expert...

After all, you won't get far in the jungle with a guide using a Swiss army knife instead of a machete. Instead, our subscribers needed a crypto veteran who not only knew his way around the jungle... but who already had been finding treasure there.

They also needed someone who could explain the peculiarities of crypto in a clear and straightforward way...

All too often, finance and investment types speak in indecipherable jargon. And with cryptos, it was even worse... Some of my conversations with job candidates would end with me feeling like I knew less about cryptos than when our meeting started.

That's when I received a cover letter that started off with...

'I have a twin brother – who I shot'...

For opening lines, that's right up there with 1984's "It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen." It shocks you, draws you in, creates intrigue, and compels you to learn more.

And it was immediately clear that this writer was overflowing with "X-factor" ‒ the life experiences that bring years of wisdom to his decision-making. From the same cover letter...

Decades ago, I bought the domain name wallstreet.com for $7 and sold it for over $1 million...

I was a Certified Financial Manager... and Series 3, 6, 7, 63, and 65 licensed dealing with corporations and high net worth individuals...

I've stayed married to the most brilliant, most difficult woman I ever met for 25-plus years...

I cut my own hair...

I wrote 12 feature movie scripts... Learned everyone likes a good story.

Clearly, Mr. Shot-My-Twin was a fantastic storyteller. And as I'd soon learn, he'd been swimming in the crypto universe since the beginning. Back when we met, he already owned two dozen cryptos. He mined altcoins – and built and sold miners – and compiled a contact list of entrepreneurs and developers in every time zone.

He continued in the cover letter...

I don't have a recent resume... Instead, I have a two-minute read for you and if you want a resume after that I'll hire someone to write me one. It will be fantastic.

Bonus points for honesty.

That is Eric Wade, and suffice to say, he got the job...

The guy who lit up my inbox that day is now the editor of Stansberry Research's two cryptocurrency-focused research services, Crypto Capital and Crypto Cashflow.

Eric has more than lived up to the promise of his great cover letters... In the rest of today's Digest, I'll share a little bit more about Eric with you and what opportunities he sees in crypto going forward.

As subscribers to his services know, Eric has an exceptionally keen eye for opportunity, value, and potential in the crypto universe. He has had so many recommendations that have soared thousands of percent that Crypto Capital has its own "Hall of Fame" table at the end of every weekday issue of the Digest.

Some of his positions include Harmony (ONE) that's up 4,118% since December 2019, Ethereum (ETH) which is up 2,997% since December 2018, and Polymath (POLY)... up 1,546% since May 2020.

In just three years, Eric has made some real money for his subscribers...

Countless readers have told us about the truly life-changing wealth that Eric's insight has helped them acquire.

At least as important, in his monthly issues and regular updates, Eric has a knack for explaining the often-puzzling world of blockchain and cryptocurrencies in an accessible, easy-to-understand manner. In what's one of the more jargon-laden corners of investing, Eric is refreshingly straightforward and direct.

And given the highly volatile nature of this asset class, it surprises most people to learn just how little trading Eric recommends... He prefers to hold high-quality positions with patience and "diamond hands."

Eric was one of my best hires ever – not for his marksmanship or fraternal love, but for his ability to tell a story and his crypto expertise... For the record, he shot his twin brother by accident when they were "idiot teenagers." And today, Eric's twin is alive and well.

Cryptos have come a long way since then...

The market capitalization of the entire crypto market recently hit about $3 trillion. Bitcoin accounts for around 42% of that total... and Ethereum, the other "blue chip" crypto, makes up 19%.

The total market cap for crypto is more than double what it was just last summer... And it's six times the total market cap from a year ago. In 2018 – not long after I hired Eric – all cryptos put together were barely worth $100 billion. That's around 3% of the current level.

After that kind of massive growth, it's easy to wonder: Is it too late? Have the big gains already been made in the crypto world?

Eric answered that question in the September issue of Crypto Capital...

As we've written before, we believe millions – if not billions – of people are on the sidelines of crypto investing. We believe somewhere between just 5% and 10% of folks use crypto. That means there's a massive potential userbase.

Of course, $3 trillion in market cap is a big number. But for context, the combined market cap of the two biggest American companies – Microsoft (MSFT) and Apple (AAPL) – is about $5 trillion today... And the entire S&P 500 Index has a total market cap around $40 trillion.

Maybe it's presumptuous to compare blockchain – the technology that underpins cryptos that was invented just a dozen years ago – to a market that's the backbone of capitalism... which is comprised of companies that have been around for centuries.

But actually... it isn't at all.

To better understand the future of cryptos, let's go back to the Internet in 1994...

That's when the web was just in its infancy... It was just getting started. At the time, a few people believed it would revolutionize how we communicate, learn, work, and live. Others thought it was a silly distraction.

Five years later, though, that had changed. Almost any asset that was remotely connected to the Internet was bid up to the stratosphere, in the dot-com bubble in 1999 and 2000.

The bust that followed destroyed trillions of dollars of value. Speculators buying flashy ideas that didn't survive the rigors of real-life business were wiped out. But the underlying technology of the Internet, of course, was more robust than ever... and just getting started.

And, two decades later, the Internet is an essential fabric that weaves together society and civilization. Nearly 5 billion people use it, and the Internet has found its way into nearly every realm of life. It has made the world a more efficient, smarter, and more connected place.

It wasn't quick or easy, but anyone who pooh-poohed the Internet in 1994 was proven dead wrong.

Let's see where cryptos are on the 'Internet timeline'...

Today, cryptos are far bigger than the Internet was in 1994...

Encouragingly – in a way – cryptos have seen their own versions of the frothy speculative era of the Internet, when a company could attach ".com" to its name and see its share price triple overnight...

Similar to how huckster public companies have added the word "bitcoin" or "blockchain" – without changing their business – and seen their share price rocket. And the crypto world suffered through "initial coin offerings" in 2017... of which more than 90% failed.

But there's a good chance that the evolution of the blockchain, and cryptos, will be roughly similar to how the Internet has developed over the past two decades. The applications of blockchain are re-scripting entire sectors and upending our assumptions about technology and its application to everything from medical care to logistics to privacy to the arts to property ownership itself... And that process is only going to accelerate.

Eric says to see the big picture, figure that what the Internet did for sharing information, blockchain does for sharing value.

Today, we're watching a new yet proven technology work its way through wild swings in market cap while attracting a growing number of investors.

Sorting out the winners from the losers isn't easy, though...

The crypto world has suffered several brutal bear markets. The volatility of cryptocurrencies makes even the most roller-coaster-like meme stocks – like GameStop (GME) or AMC Entertainment (AMC) – feel like the kiddie merry-go-round by comparison.

For every Amazon (AMZN) that turned early investors into millionaires, there were dozens of retirement killers that destroyed value and left investors with nothing... Remember pets.com or etoys.com?

And today, there are around 5,000 tradable crypto assets on the market. "Only a few dozen of those are worth anything," Eric told me. "But those could be worth a whole lot more than they are today."

That's part of why every investor should own at least a few cryptos...

Cryptocurrencies are a new asset class... like stocks, bonds, or real estate. And it makes sense for every investor to have at least a small percentage of assets in crypto.

To many people, though, that's a controversial statement. Legendary investor Warren Buffett is an outspoken critic, famously saying that bitcoin has "no unique value at all"... JPMorgan Chase's CEO Jamie Dimon recently called it "a little bit of fool's gold"... And Bill Gates faults the asset class for entirely different reasons, saying: "Bitcoin uses more electricity per transaction than any other method known to mankind."

But in the meantime, acceptance of cryptocurrencies as an asset class – and the blockchain as a vehicle of value creation – is growing. In July, a research group at the University of Chicago reported that 13% of Americans had bought or sold cryptocurrencies within the previous year – compared with 24% who'd invested in stocks.

Coinbase, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges, has 73 million verified users on its platform, which was founded just nine years ago... That's more than double the number of customers of leading online brokerage Charles Schwab, founded in 1971.

And adoption of cryptos is slowly spreading...

Some of the biggest and most savvy investors in the world, like hedge-fund giants Ray Dalio and Steven Cohen, have said that they've bought bitcoin. Big global banks are scrambling to establish cryptocurrency platforms. Crypto exchanges – a lot more user friendly than they were just a few years ago – are proliferating. One survey found that the global adoption of cryptocurrency has increased by nearly 900% over the past year. El Salvador officially declared in June that bitcoin is legal tender... That just might be a first step for other countries.

And in time, more widespread adoption will lead to higher prices of bitcoin, and other cryptos... as a virtuous circle continues.

Bitcoin could reach $1 million before the end of the decade, according to Eric...

That is a prediction that he has been making about bitcoin since it was under $4,000. It's now around $65,000. Eric explained it this way in Saturday's Masters Series essay...

In fact, thanks to a single metric – scarcity – I believe that within seven years, bitcoin could be worth 16 times as much as it is today.

With all the volatility in the crypto market, there is one aspect that needs repeating. It follows the law of supply and demand just as much as other asset classes... There is a finite supply of bitcoin ‒ there will only ever be 21 million coins produced, and about 90% of them already exist.

So as investor demand heats up, the supply will actually diminish if you factor in the slow growth in mining new coins and the halving of existing coins.

But bitcoin will be far from the only winner in the crypto market. Other altcoins on the leading edge of blockchain technology could award investors with huge gains throughout the coming years...

So, yes, Eric predicts bitcoin will reach $1 million in the next seven years. But more important, he believes that's just scratching the surface of the potential opportunity...

In fact, there's a crypto opportunity coming in January that you can't afford to ignore...

According to Eric, this event could unleash 10 million bitcoin worth of wealth in a little-known corner of the crypto market.

This coming Wednesday, November 17, at 8 p.m. Eastern time, Eric will share all the details about this specific event... And more importantly, he'll reveal how this event could give you a rare chance to make decades' worth of gains in as little as three months.

Eric will also discuss several changes to his model portfolio, which includes five coins he has never revealed before... Each of them has the potential to "10X" your money.

Eric's event is free to attend. We only ask that you register in advance. Reserve your spot right now.

New 52-week highs (as of 11/12/21): Automatic Data Processing (ADP), Applied Materials (AMAT), Best Buy (BBY), Bunge (BG), Richemont (CFRUY), CoreSite Realty (COR), Costco Wholesale (COST), Eagle Materials (EXP), Comfort Systems USA (FIX), Flowers Foods (FLO), Formula One Group (FWONA), W.W. Grainger (GWW), Home Depot (HD), indie Semiconductor (INDI), Intuit (INTU), James Hardie Industries (JHX), Liberty SiriusXM (LSXMA), Lynas Rare Earths (LYSDY), MYR Group (MYRG), Invesco S&P 500 BuyWrite Fund (PBP), The Shyft Group (SHYF), Sprott (SII), Seagate Technology (STX), Teradyne (TER), and The Trade Desk (TTD).

In today's mailbag, a couple of subscribers praise our colleague Dan Ferris for his Friday Digest on "uncle points" and why you must always be ready for what's lurking around the next corner. We'd love to hear what's on your mind today... Tell us at feedback@stansberryresearch.com.

"Just wanted to say [that I] enjoyed the article [on "uncle points"]. I had never heard the term but know the concept. Thanks." – Paid-up subscriber Kit C.

"Dan, this is Tom from Salem, Oregon. Big fan. Listen to all of the podcasts. I believe that you are right on with these points...

1. Hold at least some part of your wealth in a place that you rarely interact with...

2. Always implement a well-defined exit strategy – and more important, adhere to it religiously for all the money that you actively manage...

3. Holding a truly diversified portfolio.

"Keep up the good work. Take care." – Paid-up subscriber Tom G.

Happy investing,

Kim Iskyan
Ashton, Maryland
November 15, 2021