CZ vs. Peter Schiff: A Debate on Bitcoin vs. Tokenized Gold

At Binance Blockchain Week 2025, Binance founder CZ and Euro Pacific Asset Management CEO & Global Strategist Peter Schiff engage in a fiery debate over the value and future of Bitcoin versus tokenized gold. Peter argues that tokenized gold, backed by tangible reserves, offers superior stability and real-world utility. CZ counters that Bitcoin, as a decentralized and borderless digital asset, carries unique technological advantages and growing global demand despite volatility. The two clash on payment use cases, investment value, technical foundations, and long-term prospects, ultimately holding firm to their opposing views.

The audio transcription is done by GPT and may contain errors. Please listen to the complete podcast:

YouTube:

Spotify:

Peter Introduces the Real-World Utility of Tokenized Gold

CZ: First of all, Peter, thank you so much for being here. I feel like I’m kind of a host here, so I want to start on a polite note. I really appreciate you making the trip-and honestly, stepping onto a stage where the crowd is clearly tilted in my favor takes courage.

Peter: Well, I do see a few supporters out there. Even if they disagree with me on Bitcoin, they agree with me on plenty of other things. But yes, thank you for inviting me. At least you were willing to show up. I’ve been trying to get Michael Saylor to debate me for years-he’s too afraid. But you? No problem at all.

CZ: All right, so let me give you the floor first. I know you’re working on a tokenized-gold project now, right?

Peter: Yes, that’s actually how all of this started. I mentioned the idea on a crypto podcast you happened to hear. My site is tgold.com-the “t” stands for tokenized. Honestly, I’m surprised Tether never grabbed that domain, but anyway, it’s mine now.

On tgold.com, you can buy physical gold and silver, and we store it for you. Everything is fully segregated and allocated-this isn’t unallocated metal. You own the gold outright; it’s simply sitting in the vault under your name.

In the end, you’ll be able to withdraw your gold in two ways: Sell it for dollars; or redeem it as physical bars or coins of any size.

And soon, you’ll also be able to withdraw it as a token. You can put that token into your own wallet or send it to an exchange if we get it listed. The token represents legal ownership of the gold-just like a coat-check ticket represents your coat. The ticket isn’t the coat, but it proves you own it and can redeem it at any time.

The same applies here: you own the gold in the vault, and the token is the proof of ownership. Since the token is divisible, you can transfer all or part of it to someone else, and that person instantly owns the corresponding amount of gold. The gold never moves; only the ownership does. That makes the token usable as a means of exchange.

So now you have a monetary unit backed by actual gold-something with real store-of-value properties. Tokenization makes gold easier to transport, divide, and transact with, improving every monetary characteristic of gold without losing the most important part: its value is still anchored to real gold.

CZ: So what you’re really saying is-at least from a monetary-use perspective-tokenized gold is better than physical gold… more divisible, more portable, more transferable, more usable, right?

Peter: For monetary purposes, yes. Of course, if you’re a jeweler or a chip manufacturer and you need actual gold, you’ll redeem the token and take delivery. But as money, tokenized gold is more convenient. It’s like the old days when blacksmiths issued IOUs for stored gold-those IOUs became currency because they were easier to use. Early government currency was legitimate because it was backed by gold. Today’s fiat currency isn’t backed by anything-it only works because people trust it.

Tokenized gold just moves that concept into the digital age. Instead of handing someone a paper claim, you transfer a digital one.

Bitcoin, on the other hand, is like fiat currency: it’s backed by nothing. Tokenized gold derives value from gold. Bitcoin derives value from confidence-if people believe it’s worth something, they’ll buy it.

CZ: We’ll get into Bitcoin in more detail soon. But it does seem we at least agree on one thing: digital gold-tokenized gold-can be superior to physical gold in many ways, thanks to blockchain-based divisibility and transferability, as long as the gold itself is real.

CZ Presents Physical Gold and Raises the Question of Verifiability

CZ: Let’s talk about gold for a moment. I brought a box with me-can someone help bring it on stage? It’s pretty heavy. Inside, there’s something with Kyrgyz writing on it. I got this from Kyrgyzstan not long ago, along with a certificate. A very important person gave it to me-pure coincidence, really. Let’s take it out. Yeah, it’s heavy. You can see: “Turkistan, 1000 grams, fine gold 999.9,” plus a serial number. Go ahead, try it. Heavy, right? So… do you think it’s real?

Peter: Hard to say. Let me look. My bracelet is pure gold, and the color on this bar looks a bit off compared to it. I can’t say for sure-maybe it’s not real.

CZ: But it was given to me by someone very important.

Peter: The issue is, this isn’t from a mint I recognize. With gold, the mint’s reputation matters. If it’s a well-known mint, you trust the metal because they have a reputation to protect. But I’ve never heard of this one, so I’d probably need to assay it to be certain. And yes, the color does look a bit different from my bracelet.

CZ: Or maybe it’s your bracelet that’s off-I don’t know.

Peter: So the real question is: are you giving this to me? If you’re gifting it, I hope it’s real. If you’re not, then I guess it doesn’t matter.

CZ: How much is one kilo of gold worth right now?

Peter: Gold is roughly $4,200 per ounce.

CZ: I probably can’t give you the whole bar. Maybe a small piece.

Peter: That’s exactly why tokenization helps-you could just send me half a kilo as tokens. At Schiff Gold, we sell small-denomination coins from reputable mints, so you don’t need to wonder whether they’re real. One look and you’ll know if something’s been tampered with.

CZ: I want to give it to you, but I’m not sure you can take it out of the country.

Peter: I can just put it in my bag. Nobody’s going to care.

CZ: You sure? Some countries will arrest you if you carry gold without declaring it.

Peter: Then I’ll just say you gave it to me.

CZ: Then I’ll be in trouble. But yes, this is real gold-it was a gift from the President of Kyrgyzstan.

Peter: In that case, it probably has sentimental value now, so you definitely won’t give it to me.

CZ: After this conversation, it now has fundamental value too. But here’s the point-if I send you one bitcoin right now, we can verify instantly that you received it. And the same is true for tokenized gold: transfer it, and verification is immediate.

Peter: Yes, tokenized gold works the same way.

CZ Argues Bitcoin Is Intangible Yet Valuable; Peter Says It Lacks “Real Utility”

CZ: Let me respond to your point that “Bitcoin isn’t based on anything real.” You use an iPhone, right? You use the internet, X, Google, Facebook. All of these are virtual-there’s nothing physical about them-yet X is worth a fortune because it’s useful. The internet is virtual too, but it clearly has immense value.

Bitcoin works the same way. I’m not sure everyone here realizes this, but there’s no such thing as an actual “bitcoin” sitting on the blockchain-not physically, not even as a standalone digital object. All the blockchain stores are transactions. When someone says, “I sent you 1 bitcoin,” what really happened is just a new ledger entry that says, “I transferred 1 BTC to you.” Nothing actually “moves.”

We know an address owns 1 bitcoin only because the system traces all its incoming and outgoing transactions and calculates the net result. Bitcoin doesn’t exist in a specific place-but that doesn’t make it valueless. Google is virtual, X is virtual, and both are incredibly valuable. Value has never depended on having a physical form.

Even for gold, the industrial use-like in chips-is tiny. Gold is valuable mainly because it’s scarce and considered a precious metal, not because industry needs huge amounts of it.

Peter: Sure, intangible assets can have value. Companies have goodwill-also intangible. That’s not my issue. My point is that Bitcoin has no actual use. Yes, I can send it to you and you can send it to someone else, but that transfer is the only thing it does. The system is clever, I’ll give it that, but when I transfer Bitcoin to you, I haven’t given you anything real.

When I send you tokenized gold, I’m transferring ownership of actual gold. And gold’s value comes from what it can do as a metal. It has physical properties other metals can’t replicate. Industries must buy gold-they can’t just swap in copper or something else. That real-world necessity gives gold enduring value. And because gold is scarce and supply grows slowly, that scarcity drives its price.

Gold is also a monetary reserve for central banks-they need it to back their currencies. That’s another real use case that affects its price. And importantly, gold doesn’t decay. It doesn’t degrade over time. Gold mined thousands of years ago still exists exactly as it was.

So gold’s price today reflects the present value of all its uses from now into the distant future-something no perishable or consumable commodity can offer. That’s why gold is a genuine long-term store of value. People need it now, and people will still need it in a thousand years.

Debate on Whether Bitcoin Qualifies as “Money”

CZ: When the price of gold rises, does that mean central banks are printing more money to buy gold?

Peter: Central banks are always printing money-that’s the source of inflation.

CZ: Earlier you mentioned utility value. So you agree Bitcoin doesn’t need physical form to have value, right? It doesn’t need to be tangible.

Peter: It still has to do something. It needs real-world utility.

CZ: But gold’s industrial use isn’t what gives it its value. Gold is valuable mainly because it’s scarce and considered a precious metal. Bitcoin also has broad utility. It’s not just for sending and receiving-it represents an entire industry, a new monetary technology.

Peter: It’s not a new monetary technology, because it’s not actually used as money. And it’s not truly “money,” because it’s not a commodity. By definition, money is the most liquid commodity-and Bitcoin doesn’t meet that standard, regardless of how governments classify it.

CZ: Different people define “money” and “value” differently. But Bitcoin is now a 2 to 2.3 trillion–dollar asset, and it’s still growing.

Peter: Sure, Bitcoin has a price-that’s obvious. But it has a price only because people are willing to buy it, and many holders refuse to sell because they believe the price will keep rising. That doesn’t mean it has intrinsic value. Its price is driven purely by speculation. It’s not used as money-it’s a speculative digital asset.

From my perspective, people “collect” Bitcoin because they think someone else will pay more for it later.

CZ: I think your definition of “money” is very narrow-a definition you hold, and governments hold. If we ask this audience how many consider Bitcoin money, plenty of hands would go up. Of course, this crowd is biased. But still, many people do treat Bitcoin as money. Whether we label it that way is a separate definitional debate.

Peter: But nothing is priced in Bitcoin. It’s not a unit of account.

CZ: Price is relative. We can just as well quote the price of the U.S. dollar in bitcoin.

Peter: That’s just an exchange rate. I’m talking about real-world goods and services-including wages. No one quotes a fixed quantity of bitcoin as the price. Even when someone gets paid in bitcoin, their salary is still denominated in dollars or euros, and during payout, they compute how many bitcoin equal that salary. So Bitcoin isn’t a unit of account. It’s not used as a medium of exchange. And it can’t be a store of value, because you can’t store something you don’t truly have.

CZ: Price volatility doesn’t stop something from being used for payment. I received Bitcoin as a salary in 2014.

Peter: What was your salary?

CZ: Not much-around $100,000 at the time.

Peter: No, I mean: was it denominated in a fixed amount of Bitcoin?

CZ: As you said, we recalculated every month.

Peter: Which proves it wasn’t money. If it were real money, your salary would have been fixed-like “0.1 BTC per month”-regardless of its price movements.

CZ: We actually do have contracts at Binance that are denominated directly in bitcoin. For example, when early investors or partners exited, we offered them a choice: take dollars or take bitcoin. We fixed the amount in bitcoin at the time, and that value later went up significantly.

Peter: But that’s a special case-those people were already Bitcoin investors. They wanted Bitcoin.

CZ: True, it’s not the majority. But it does happen. People do transact using bitcoin as the unit.

Peter: That’s the exception, not the rule. The vast majority of Bitcoin transactions aren’t for buying goods or services. They’re people buying and selling Bitcoin among themselves-no labor exchanged, no goods exchanged-just trading. Nothing more.

CZ: Stocks work the same way.

Whether Bitcoin Has Value & Whether It Resembles a Ponzi Scheme

CZ: We’re drifting off-topic. I’m not trying to argue whether Bitcoin is money-otherwise we’ll get stuck debating the definition of “money.”

The more important question is: does Bitcoin have value? That’s the real disagreement here.Many people here clearly believe it does. Yes, part of Bitcoin’s value comes from speculation-people trading it on Binance and other exchanges-but a large part comes from its utility. I can carry it anywhere; I can cross borders with it instantly.

But with this one-kilogram gold bar, I can’t just carry it across countries. Gold is a store of value, sure-but Bitcoin has more reasons supporting its value. It’s not only a store of value; it has appreciated for 15 years straight.

Peter: Tokenized gold already solves the portability issue. You don’t need to carry the actual bar-you carry the token.

CZ: But tokenized gold requires trusting a third party.

Peter: Then find a trustworthy one.

CZ: I could-but with Bitcoin, I don’t need to trust anyone. That’s utility.

Peter: You still need trust. You have to trust the technology. You have to trust that people will continue wanting Bitcoin in the future. You mentioned the 21 million cap-

CZ: Yes, and it’s easily verifiable.

Peter: But there are 2.1 quadrillion satoshis. At that denomination, it’s not scarce at all-there’s a massive supply. Sure, the total is fixed, but that number is irrelevant if people no longer want it.

CZ: But people do want it. Look at the growth numbers-Binance alone is approaching 300 million users, and growth is steady.

Peter: Exactly-there are far more gamblers today than a few years ago. People have been lured in by hype and by the huge profits early investors made. Those early adopters are now selling to these newcomers. That casino-like behavior attracts crowds.

But if you’re talking about what Bitcoin can do-well, thousands of tokens can do the exact same thing. Bitcoin isn’t unique in being cross-border, portable, or transferable.

You said we don’t know how much gold exists in the Earth. True. But we also don’t know how many new cryptocurrencies will exist. Anyone can create one out of thin air-no barriers. Look at all the meme coins: tens of thousands popping up endlessly. They all compete with Bitcoin in the same market, with unlimited supply potential.

CZ: Creating a new coin doesn’t create value. A token needs adoption at scale. It needs real utility validated by a community, not just features in a product. You say Bitcoin is mainly used for gambling, but Binance alone has 300 million users who have interacted with Bitcoin in some way.

Peter: Right-and you’re running one of the world’s biggest casinos.

CZ: It’s not a casino.

Peter: It absolutely is. The house always wins-your position is very profitable.

CZ: This ecosystem is larger than the population of many countries. That’s not a small group.

Peter: Scale doesn’t change the nature of something. If something functions like a decentralized Ponzi scheme, making it bigger doesn’t suddenly make it legitimate. It’s still the same structure-just with more participants.

CZ: So you’re saying 300 million people are in a Ponzi scheme?

Peter: Yes. It’s a huge Ponzi, but it cannot grow forever. Look at what’s happened in the past few years-Bitcoin is down 40% against gold compared to four years ago.

CZ: Is that accurate? I’m not sure.

Peter: Four years ago, at $69,000, one Bitcoin bought 37.2 ounces of gold. Today, it buys 22.15 ounces. That’s a 40% drop.

CZ: So gold outperformed Bitcoin in the last four years.

Peter: By a lot.

CZ: What about eight years?

Peter: Let me finish the point. In the past four years, look at everything that happened in Bitcoin: Bitcoin ETFs launched, companies copied MicroStrategy, borrowing money to buy bitcoin, MicroStrategy itself issued debt to buy $40B worth of bitcoin, other corporations piled in, Super Bowl ads, celebrity endorsements, the NFT boom, El Salvador adopting Bitcoin as legal tender, and the “Bitcoin strategic reserve” narrative.

All of that unprecedented hype, promotion, adoption-and yet the price still fell. If Bitcoin can’t rise under those conditions and instead loses 40% of its real value, why would it go up in the future? To me, that’s a sign the story is over.

CZ: But Bitcoin’s base price was much lower four years ago. You can’t just pick one time frame.

Peter: This isn’t about cherry-picking. If Bitcoin claims to be “digital gold,” then pricing it in gold is the most accurate comparison. And over the past four years, it’s down 40%.

I’m picking the all-time high-because that’s what investors look at. And remember, during these four years of nonstop hype, everyone said Bitcoin was going to skyrocket. Michael Saylor said it would hit $10 million. He told people to mortgage their homes, borrow money, go all-in-that Bitcoin was a guaranteed win.

If it were guaranteed, why isn’t it at $10 million already? Markets price in expectations early.

You can’t say “it will definitely go up” while the price is not going up at all.

CZ: Markets need time to reach long-term value. Even if you believe gold will be worth more in the future, you wouldn’t expect it to instantly jump to that price today.

Peter: That’s because fiat keeps depreciating-dollars, euros, yen. Yes, we agree on that. But this has nothing to do with Bitcoin. Bitcoin’s price depends solely on how many people want to buy versus sell. Gold has real demand-industries and central banks must buy it. If gold drops, demand rises. That stabilizes price.

But no one needs Bitcoin. People only want it because they believe the price will go up. The moment people stop believing that, there is no reason to hold it.

CZ: Let’s talk about the future-specifically, young people. Do you think the next generation will prefer Bitcoin or gold?

Peter: Gold. Because many of their friends will lose money on Bitcoin. And young people have one advantage-

CZ: What about your son?

Peter: He already sold his bitcoin. But look, losing money young is actually valuable-you have your whole life to earn it back, and you learn from the experience. When you’re older and have real wealth, that’s when losses become catastrophic. So for all the young people who will get wiped out in Bitcoin-it’s a painful but useful lesson.

CZ: But Bitcoin went from zero in 2010 to fifty cents when the first pizza was purchased, to $100,000-well, $90,000 right now. How many people here made money on Bitcoin?

Peter: And how many who “made money” actually sold and realized gains? Very few.

No question, early buyers made fortunes. I know people who made hundreds of millions-some billions. Many are my neighbors now. They can afford those homes because they sold a lot of bitcoin. They cashed out.

People who bought over the past few years, though? Most haven’t made money. Their losses are what funded the early adopters’ gains.

Bitcoin is simply a mechanism for transferring wealth from buyers to sellers. When new bitcoins are mined, no real wealth is created. We now have 20 million bitcoin that didn’t exist 15 years ago, but the world isn’t richer because of that.

Wealth has merely shifted from some people to others.

And many losers don’t even realize they’ve lost yet, because their bitcoins still show a $93,000 price tag. But if they actually try to exit, they’ll find the liquidity isn’t there. If enough holders try to sell at once, the market collapses.

Debate on Whether Crypto Payment Cards Truly Count as “Paying With Crypto”

CZ: Let me share a story I mentioned earlier today. When I was dealing with some issues in the U.S., I received a letter of support from a user in Africa. He told me that before crypto-before Bitcoin-he had to spend three full days every month just to pay a bill: walking from his village to the payment station, and then walking all the way back.

After he started using crypto through Binance, the same payment took three minutes.

And over time, he slowly accumulated $50, $100, $300-even $1,000. In some poorer African countries, $1,000 is life-changing. It genuinely improved his living conditions.

Peter: Yes, that absolutely has value. But you don’t need Bitcoin to achieve that. You can use stablecoins, or tokenized gold, and still leverage blockchain rails to make payments.

CZ: Sure, you can use stablecoins-but stablecoins still rely on blockchain. And today, the strongest blockchain use case is still Bitcoin. It’s the largest crypto asset by market cap.

And when we talk about blockchain adoption, it’s Bitcoin plus other major cryptocurrencies pushing that forward.

You mentioned earlier that “anyone can issue a token,” and that’s true-but that doesn’t mean those tokens have real value.

Bitcoin is different because it already has a massive global user base. Other major cryptocurrencies-definitely including those on Binance-are approaching that level.

Putting it simply: issuing a token doesn’t create value; usage creates value.

And Bitcoin is being used-by that user in Africa, and by many others. Its use cases are growing, not stagnating. It’s a technology still evolving.

Peter: I disagree. I remember when Bitcoin first hit $1,000 around 2013. I opposed it then too, even though I admitted the price could rise further because people were clearly buying it and the bubble could grow. But fundamentally, nothing changed about Bitcoin.

Back then, many merchants started announcing “We accept Bitcoin,” but that was only because a new group of people suddenly got rich and merchants wanted to attract their spending. That trend faded long ago.

Today, using Bitcoin for payments is even less popular. And many have openly acknowledged that Bitcoin doesn’t work well as currency-so the narrative was changed to “digital gold.”

But it’s not digital gold either. You can’t draw a picture of a hamburger and say you have “digital food.” Try living off digital food-you’ll starve.

CZ: Let me ask the audience-who here has a Binance Card? The VISA one. Thank you! Here it is.

Peter: So what you’re saying is, with this card, you can spend the tokens in your wallet, right? But essentially, you’re just selling Bitcoin and the merchant receives dollars.

CZ: Yes-and it works really well.

Peter: That’s exactly what I’m trying to do with gold.

CZ: But tokenized gold still uses blockchain.

Peter: It doesn’t have to. A debit card system works the same way. When I use a debit card, I’m basically selling assets and paying in cash.

Your card sells Bitcoin, then pays in fiat. It’s no different from a brokerage account offering a debit card. You’re not paying with Bitcoin. You’re selling Bitcoin and paying with fiat.My goal with gold is different-I want actual ownership of gold to transfer between buyer and seller, so the entire transaction stays in gold. No conversion to fiat at all.

But today, your card converts Bitcoin into fiat; the merchant never receives Bitcoin.

CZ: How many people are using gold as payment today?

Peter: Almost none.

CZ: But more people use Bitcoin for payment than gold, right?

Peter: But your users aren’t paying with Bitcoin. They’re selling Bitcoin and paying fiat. The merchant never touches Bitcoin.

CZ: Think of it this way: historically, crypto payments had two major problems. Merchants didn’t want to accept crypto, even if they did, users couldn’t easily pay them. Our card splits the process into two halves.

From the user’s perspective, they swipe the card and their crypto balance goes down.

From the merchant’s perspective, they receive fiat or whichever currency they prefer.

We handle the conversion in the middle. That solves both sides.

Peter: I plan to do the same with gold. But I believe that once inflation becomes more severe in developed countries, merchants will eventually prefer being paid in gold.

CZ: How many merchants want that today?

Peter: Almost none, because they don’t have the option.

But imagine you’re a merchant and inflation isn’t 2% per year-it’s 2% per week. You sell your inventory, and by the time you restock, your costs are much higher.

If you accept gold, you can immediately restock using gold, and its real purchasing power doesn’t erode like fiat.

CZ: But gold dropped recently. It hit a peak and then declined.

Peter: Sure, there are short-term fluctuations. But gold is far less volatile than Bitcoin.

CZ: Some merchants have profit margins of only 10%. A 10% gold drop is huge.

Peter: And Bitcoin can drop 10% in a single day.

CZ: But millions of Binance Cards are already being used.

Peter: Maybe you can help issue my gold card too.

CZ: We’d be happy to. I’m not anti-gold-I just think Bitcoin is a better version of gold.

You said not many people pay with Bitcoin, but many payments happen “quietly” behind the scenes.

Peter: But that’s not paying with Bitcoin.

CZ: From the user’s point of view, they are paying with Bitcoin. They’re not thinking about conversions or backend processes.

Peter: But I can do the same with gold or a stock portfolio. I can give customers a card, and each swipe simply sells some assets to pay in fiat.

Your card works the same way-sell Bitcoin, then pay fiat.

CZ: But the key is: people are already using crypto in payments.

Peter: No. They’re using crypto as collateral-then selling it and paying with fiat. That is not the same as using Bitcoin as a payment medium.

CZ: Peter, you’re defining the entire backend flow as part of the “payment.” But from the user’s perspective, they swipe the card and the transaction is done. That feels like paying with crypto.

Peter: I understand. But there’s still a fundamental difference.

Whether Bitcoin Is Driven Mainly by Speculators

Peter: If Bitcoin’s price suddenly crashes-say today it still buys a lot, but tomorrow after a big drop it buys almost nothing-people relying on Bitcoin for daily payments will be in serious trouble.

CZ: I don’t think most people here would face that. They hold enough crypto to be fine.

Peter: But what if Bitcoin drops to $9,000? It absolutely could. No one knows the future.

CZ: All prices fluctuate. Even fiat currencies fluctuate against each other.

Peter: That’s a relative fluctuation between currencies-not loss of purchasing power.

CZ: Purchasing power fluctuates too. Calling something a “stablecoin” is misleading-nothing in this world is truly stable.

Peter: It’s at least stable relative to the dollar, even though the dollar itself is unstable. My point is: if everything you can do with Bitcoin I can also do with gold-why choose a token backed by nothing? If you can hold a token backed by real gold, why prefer what is essentially a crypto version of fiat?

CZ: But anything you can do with gold or fiat, you can do with Bitcoin.

Peter: No, you can’t-because Bitcoin can’t store value.

CZ: Bitcoin is an excellent store of value.

Peter: No-it’s a speculative asset whose price happened to rise during its first 15 years. That timeframe is far too short to prove it holds value long-term.

Bitcoin has a price, which I acknowledge. But price and value are completely different. You can store value, but you can’t store a price.

Bitcoin has a price today, but no one knows tomorrow’s price. It has no intrinsic value today and won’t have intrinsic value tomorrow. People only buy it because they think it’ll make them rich-like a lottery ticket.Once people stop believing Bitcoin is “going to the moon,” demand disappears.

CZ: You’re viewing it purely through a speculator’s lens.

Peter: Because that’s who’s buying Bitcoin-speculators. Sure, this room may have hardcore Bitcoin builders, but they’re a tiny minority. Who do you think makes up the majority of buyers?

CZ: How many people here develop Bitcoin-ecosystem projects? Developers, engineers, founders? Quite a few. So it’s not all speculation.

Peter: But they’re tiny compared to the people who actually drive the price. Look at ETF buyers, corporate treasury desks buying BTC-none of them are “believers.” They buy because it’s going up, because the hype tells them to, because analysts recommend it.

They treat Bitcoin exactly like a stock ticker. They don’t care about custody, decentralization, or philosophy-it’s just another line item in a brokerage account.

And once it stops going up, they’ll sell and move on.

CZ: But the same behavior exists in stock markets. Traditional finance is full of speculators, yet those markets also have real builders who create true utility. Speculators being loud doesn’t negate the underlying value of an asset. NASDAQ exists because people speculate.

Those buying Bitcoin ETFs already buy stocks, commodities, currency ETFs. Speculators are everywhere. Their presence doesn’t mean Bitcoin has no value.

Peter: But the presence of speculators in equities doesn’t justify Bitcoin.

When I speculate on a stock, at least in theory, I’m evaluating a real business-one that can grow revenue, earnings, dividends. I’m betting on real economic output.

CZ: Like Binance?

Peter: Binance is a great business-because you’re the house in a casino. The house always wins.

CZ: We’re not a casino. We’re a licensed financial institution in over 30 jurisdictions now.

Peter: Fine. But I’m talking about people who trade Bitcoin on your platform.

Back to my point: when I buy a stock, I’m buying something that produces income. Real estate too-cash flow, yields, rents.

Bitcoin produces nothing. When I buy Bitcoin, the only thing I’m betting on is someone in the future paying more.

That buyer will only pay more because they believe someone after them will pay even more.

It’s layers upon layers of price expectations-no underlying value.That hasn’t changed since day one. Bitcoin’s entire model depends on constant new demand.

CZ: But we already agreed speculators are only a small part of crypto, even if they trade a lot. They don’t represent the whole ecosystem.

Peter: But they’re the ones pushing Bitcoin to $90,000.

CZ: You’re taking a small segment and projecting it onto the whole. If only speculators existed, Bitcoin wouldn’t be priced here. There must be fundamental holders who anchor the price.

Peter: But Bitcoin hit $90,000 because of speculative inflows. Without ETFs, without corporate treasury buyers, without these pools of speculative capital, where would the price be?

CZ: I doubt either of us can convince the other on this. But you’re generalizing one subset of activity to the entire industry.

If only speculators existed, Bitcoin wouldn’t be at today’s valuation. There must be underlying long-term demand.

Peter: Over the last four years-the same four years where Bitcoin fell 40% against gold-I’d bet at least half of today’s holders bought during that period.

CZ: I’m not sure I agree.

Peter: And in terms of market cap, more than half the capital inflow likely came in during those four years.

CZ: In every cycle, the later stages always absorb more capital.

Peter: Which means many holders now bought high.

CZ: But this cycle also brought huge ETF inflows.

Peter: Exactly-and those inflows are regular retail investors behind the ETFs. They weren’t early; they didn’t benefit from huge gains. They were encouraged to buy at elevated prices-”the top.”

They don’t have early-holder profits cushioning their downside.

CZ: No asset guarantees massive gains. You can’t expect any asset to endlessly multiply.

Peter: But that is what they were told. Look at predictions from earlier this year: No one predicted Bitcoin would fall, every forecast was $200,000, $250,000, influencers like Saylor kept saying “Buy, borrow, mortgage everything-BTC is a sure thing”

Yet the reality? Bitcoin is lower than it was on January 1. Most people who bought this year are underwater. They didn’t buy it to use-they bought it to get rich. And right now, it isn’t working.

CZ: But it’s higher than last November.

Peter: Only because it dropped sharply before then. The point is-this year’s predictions were all wrong. People were talked into buying, expecting massive gains, and instead they’re losing money. That’s why Bitcoin has stalled.

CZ: There will always be analysts making predictions. I personally don’t make price forecasts. Prices rise and fall, and investors must understand the risks.

Peter: But many clearly don’t understand the risks.

CZ: Same with stocks, same with gold. Risk is everywhere.

Peter: But gold didn’t pull in naive retail investors in a frenzy. I’ve run Schiff Gold for years-

CZ: Then why did crypto attract huge retail inflows while gold didn’t?

Peter: Because gold doesn’t have a flashy “get-rich-quick” narrative. Bitcoin does.

CZ: But you said earlier gold outperformed Bitcoin?

Peter: In the past four years, yes. Gold outperformed Bitcoin. But people still bought Bitcoin, not gold.

Central banks bought gold-they know what they’re doing. They’re not buying Bitcoin.

But retail investors will eventually come back to gold, especially after the crypto bubble deflates.In fact, Bitcoin’s early success partly came from gold being stuck in a 12–13 year sideways market. Gold surged from 1999 to 2011, then stagnated. Bitcoin appeared right in that window, branded as “digital gold,” “gold 2.0,” and absorbed attention and capital.

CZ: That’s exactly when Bitcoin emerged.

Peter: Exactly. But now things are different: Gold doubled in two years, silver hit new all-time highs, breaking the $50 double-top.

We’re entering a new multi-year precious metals bull market.

In this environment, Bitcoin has trouble competing: Gold holders have no reason to sell gold for Bitcoin, those who sold gold for Bitcoin in past years will regret it and want to switch back.

But when many try to sell Bitcoin at once, there won’t be enough buyers. That’s when Bitcoin collapses.

CZ: I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree. I genuinely hope gold performs well, and I hope your tokenized gold project succeeds.

Peter: Maybe we can even collaborate.

CZ: Definitely.

Peter: I’d like my token listed on Binance.

CZ: Absolutely-welcome to the blockchain world. Of course, I still believe differently: gold will do well, but Bitcoin will do even better.

Peter: I don’t think Bitcoin can compete with gold-especially now.

CZ: We’ll see next year. Thanks, Peter, for joining us, and best of luck with digitizing gold.

Peter: My pleasure-thank you.

CZ: Thank you all. See you next time.

Follow us
Twitter: https://twitter.com/WuBlockchain
Telegram: https://t.me/wublockchainenglish