Transcription
Silver has absolutely exploded so far in 2026, blowing straight through levels that have capped it for decades. Monetary metals and hard assets everywhere are waking up at the same time. But Bitcoin continues to kick dust. This has led a lot of people, especially gold and silver bugs, to declare victory. But what if silver's breakout isn't the end of the story? What if it's the final nail in the coffin of a monetary system, under extreme stress? Because once you understand why silver and gold are moving like this and why critics like Peter Schiff are suddenly everywhere again, you'll understand exactly what comes next and why historically Bitcoin always moves last.
Welcome to No Second Best, the show where conviction meets reality and reality points straight to Bitcoin. I'm your host, Hurley. Now, let's get into it.
Silver doesn't usually move like this. It doesn't drift. It doesn't grind. And it definitely doesn't explode unless something underneath the system is under stress. Silver is a strange asset. It sits right at the intersection of money, industry, leverage, and speculation. Silver markets are smaller, more opaque, and more heavily shorted than gold. That makes violent moves in silver uniquely dangerous for the financial system. When silver breaks out violently, like it did this month, it's not just price discovery. It's stress testing leverage. That's why some people are starting to ask an uncomfortable question. What happens if silver doesn't just rally, but forces someone on the other side to fail? Historically, when silver starts behaving badly, it's a signal. Gold tends to confirm monetary stress, and silver tends to expose it. And right now, both are flashing at the same time.
And this isn't just theoretical stress. You can point to exactly where it's showing up. Just look at Japan. Japan has the highest debt to GDP ratio in the developed world. Its central bank has been the most aggressive money printer on the planet for decades. And now Japanese government bond yields are at their highest level since the mid-1990s. This is not just a normal move. This is the bond market pushing back. The yen has become the canary in the coal mine for fiat currencies. When the world's most controlled bond market starts to break, it tells you something much bigger is underway. So gold and silver aren't reacting to inflation headlines. They're reacting to sovereign balance sheets starting to fail stress tests.
So gold continues to have its best run ever, now up over 80% in one year. Silver is ripping faces off, up an eyewatering 200% in the last year. Meanwhile, Bitcoin continues to grind sideways and down. In fact, Bitcoin is on pace to finish its fourth straight month in the red. Sentiment is now as bad as it's been in all of its short history. This has led many monetary metal maxis to do victory laps online. But it's at times like this that we need to slow things down and zoom out. Let's not forget over the last 10 years, Bitcoin is up 48,000%. While gold is only up 226% and the S&P 500 is up about the same. Is that too far back for you? What about since 2019? Over the last 6 years, Bitcoin is up nearly 1300%. That even dwarfs silver's 588% and gold's 300%. If you didn't know these numbers, you totally think Bitcoin has been a disappointment. In the short term, sure, it's definitely been underwhelming, but you can cherrypick any short-term data and draw misleading conclusions. In reality, Bitcoin has been the single largest repricing of capital in modern financial history.
So, the real question isn't what's wrong with Bitcoin. The real question is why does Bitcoin always inconsistently feel the worst right before it matters the most? Here's something that many are missing and that I pointed out in the last episode. Bitcoin is in a bare market, just not in dollars. When you price Bitcoin in gold instead of fiat, a very consistent pattern appears. Every cycle, Bitcoin bleeds against gold for about 14 months. Every cycle, that bleed ends quietly, and every cycle, Bitcoin then violently reverses. This is where we are right now. January 2026 would be month 14. Now, this doesn't mean Bitcoin can't go lower priced in gold. It just means that this is exactly what accumulation phases have always felt like. Boring, frustrating, and confidence destroying.
Now, the obituaries calling for Bitcoin's death might be finally over, as there was none in 2025 for the first time ever, but the skeptics and haters are out in full force right now. And this brings us to our beloved Peter Schiff. Peter has been back out running laps around Bitcoin following the short-term outperformance. He was even on Tucker Carlson yesterday, and of course, he wasn't able to not talk about Bitcoin, mentioning the word Bitcoin over 50 times in the conversation. In the first clip, Tucker asks a very simple question. If the world clearly needs a new neutral reserve asset and the dollar is being weaponized, why couldn't Bitcoin be the next global reserve currency? Let's listen to Peter's answer.
>> So, clearly there needs to be a new global reserve currency. You don't want it to be one owned by a geopolitical rival. So, why wouldn't Tether? Why wouldn't Bitcoin be the new global reserve currency?
>> Well, first of all, gold is money. It's not currency. And so there's a difference between money and currency. So currency is backed by money. So when we were on a gold standard and we had paper that was redeemable in gold, the paper was currency. The gold was money. So currency is like a money substitute. But you can have two kinds of currency. You can have legitimate currency which is backed by real money or you can have fiat currency which is backed by nothing. And so what we have now is is fiat currency. And the question is, well, could we replace that with Bitcoin? Um, and I don't think that that's possible because I don't think that Bitcoin has any value uh beyond its appeal that you know, you know, a greater fool is going to come and buy it. Central banks can't hold Bitcoin as a reserve against their own currency. If they had to sell it, I mean, the price would drop sharply. You know, you know, you have to have real money. That's why all these central banks,
>> but under our current system, you don't have real money. You have the US dollar which is real because people have decided it's real. It's it's an act of faith and their faith in that is declining because it's been used as a political weapon as you I thought so crisply explained
>> and so you need to replace it with something. Why wouldn't bit why would Bitcoin be any different from the dollar except you like start a new? Well, the diff the main difference there is, you know, they're both in a way fiat, right? In that both Bitcoin and the dollar derive their value from faith and confidence, right?
>> But Bitcoin, people are buying, most people who are buying Bitcoin are buying Bitcoin to get more dollars. They they're thinking the price is going to go way up and they'll be able to sell out and have more dollars than they started with. Most people are not getting into Bitcoin because they just want a safe store of value. If that was the case, they they would buy gold. they're speculating in it. Um, but the central banks, right, these big central banks are not going to be able to put large quantities of their dollar reserves into Bitcoin. Uh, it there's just it's not a reliable long-term store of value for them. That's what they're looking for. They're looking for something to replace the dollar to back up their currency.
Schiff says something that sounds sophisticated but completely collapses when you slow it down. He claims Bitcoin and the dollar are both fiat currencies. That Bitcoin is backed by faith. That central banks could never hold it. Let's get something straight. Fiat doesn't mean belief-based. Fiat comes from the Latin term meaning let it be done. Fiat money is money created by decree, by command, by authority. In fact, in the Bible, in the Latin translation of the Hebrew Old Testament, when God says, "Let there be light," the word fiat is used for let there be. Fiat money is quite literally human beings playing God in decreeing let there be money. Bitcoin is the exact opposite of this. It has no issuer, no committee, no supply discretion, no ability to change the rules. Calling Bitcoin fiat is like calling gravity a government policy.
Shift also leans on an old distinction. Gold is money and currency is just a claim on money. That framework made sense a century ago, but it doesn't survive in a digital world. Bitcoin isn't a claim on money. It is the settlement asset. It has no counterparty, no redemption risk, and no promise required. Gold is the money that needed layers of paper to scale as the global economy became more interconnected. Bitcoin is the first monetary asset that can act as both global settlement money and medium of exchange currency at the same time.
Then Shiff falls back on the same familiar entired argument against Bitcoin, the greater fool theory. If if Americans want to throw their money away in a lot of these crypto companies, all right, I mean, it's it's unfortunate, but if the government is now promoting it and pushing money into this industry that might have gone someplace else if it was a free market, this is doing a lot of harm. Why is it throwing? I mean, you know, you meet all these people who've made hundreds of millions. You meet kids who've made real money from crypto. Why is it throwing it away?
>> Well, because where did they make it? They they didn't make money in crypto because they, you know, produced products that we consume or provide services that improve our lives. The people who have made money in crypto, and I know a lot of them, they've made money in crypto because the crypto that they bought a long time ago went way up.
>> How's that different from buying gold?
>> Well, I'm I'm not people I don't know a lot of people who got rich buying gold, right?
>> Uh >> well, I've done really well, just being honest. And so have you.
>> No. Well, okay. We've tripled our money. I'm not Wait, but I'm talking about I'm talking about people who bought Bitcoin for a dollar and now it's $90,000, right? You're talking about people who put Okay, so it's a big runup, but it's the same. But when you buy gold, which I'm to I own a gold company. I'm totally for buying gold,
>> but you're not
>> it's not a creative act. You're not making anything. You're not making anyone's life better. You're not really adding to the sum total of the economy. You're not doing anything other than buying something low and holding until it gets high.
>> Right? But there is a big difference. I and I'll get to that in a minute. But the people who have made money in in crypto, right? It they bought it at a very low price and now other people are buying it at a much higher price believing that they're going to be able to do the same thing. They're people who are buying Bitcoin now at, you know, $90,000, whatever it's at. They're buying it because they think it's going to a million. They think they'll be able to sell it at a million. And of course, the only reason someone's going to buy it at a million is because they think it's going to 10 million, right? So, it's all this greater fool theory.
Here's the problem with this argument. As Tucker smartly points out, gold also has no yield and no cash flows. And to counter Shift's point, there is almost no industrial justification for these prices. People buy gold because they believe others will value it later. It's a trusted tried-and-true store of value. Whether Peter wants to admit it or not, Bitcoin and gold are both monetary assets. One is just thousands of years old and the other is new and still gaining trust as a proven store of value. The difference isn't belief. Both gold and Bitcoin would collapse if trust and belief in it as a store of value went away. The difference is architecture.
Owning physical metals feels great until you try to sell them. With this huge spike in silver, particularly, the stories of investors trying to sell have popped up online, and it's not as easy or fun as it might seem. Spreads widen, dealers, and liquidity disappears when you need it most. A,000 ounces of silver might be worth $100,000 on paper, but in practice, you're often lucky to get 70 cents on the dollar. Bitcoin, you can sell $100,000 instantly, 24 hours a day, anywhere on Earth at market price with very small exchange spreads. It's the most liquid asset on Earth. And if you don't believe me, try it out for yourself.
This is where Larry Leard gets it exactly right. Gold and silver smell debasement first. Bitcoin always reacts later. And when Bitcoin finally moves, it doesn't move politely.
>> So I think on the next big print, the Fed balance sheet goes from that 65 to, I don't know, 10, 15, 20, I mean, some big number, right? And if if the entire 38, you know, trillion came at it, you know, it would really go to a big number and we'd be off on the road to hyperinflation. So that's not my base case, by the way. I think we're just going to have high inflation. But um, you know, all of these things to me, you know, the markets are telling us the silver market and gold market are telling us these things are in the works. I mean, gold and silver are really great at smelling this stuff and there's a chart I put out as well in the past and it's all over my Twitter feed and others that it showed and I this this time reminds me very much of 2020. So so the co event occurred, the Fed pivoted, um, they started printing a lot of money quickly. Gold went from 1,200 to 2,000 quite quickly and Bitcoin just sat there, you know, for for months it was kind of locked between like seven and $10,000 and you know, it just kind of went sideways and then suddenly it woke up that fall in October and it just went on a tear and in the next six months it went from 10 to 60. That's 6x. And so there was, you know, it was kind of like gold moved first, gold smelled it first, and then Bitcoin followed the flag. And I I kind of expect the same thing this time. Gold's doing its thing. It's moving. It says the debasement is coming. The debasement will come. Gold will keep running. And then at some point, as the debasement comes and the money flows in, Bitcoin is going to wake up and go from, you know, 90 to 270 or, you know, three 3x easily in my view. So
>> I mean, is it tomorrow? No. I mean, I I have that as within six to 6 to 12 months.
Gold added roughly $20 trillion in market cap in 18 months. Silver added over $4 trillion in less than a year. Bitcoin's entire market cap is still under 2 trillion. The idea that Bitcoin is too large now to have massive gains is ridiculous and gold and silver are glaring examples. Capital is rotating hard into hard assets and Bitcoin is the hardest. It has a smaller basin, a hard cap, and no supply elasticity. When that dam breaks, it breaks fast. And here's a stat that really puts it into perspective. This month, silver added more market cap than Bitcoin currently has in total. If that kind of repricing is possible in a legacy metal market, the idea that Bitcoin can't move because of size completely collapses.
And this is where people start realizing that owning Bitcoin isn't just about conviction. It's about execution. If you're holding meaningful amounts, questions come up fast. How do you hold it securely? What about passing it on to your heirs? How do you hold Bitcoin across decades, not cycles? That's what Swan Private works on every single day. From advanced multi-IG custody to inheritance and estate planning to tax aware strategy and helping families and businesses hold real Bitcoin in a way that doesn't rely on exchanges, on leverage, or on perfect timing. To learn more about what Swan Private offers, visit swan.com/noscondbest.
And there's one last piece of this story that almost no one is talking about, and it has nothing to do with price, cycles, or sentiment. It has to do with who ends up owning assets over the next 20 years. Right now, millennials already hold far more Bitcoin as a percentage of their wealth than boomers do. And not just a little bit more, multiples more. And that matters because boomers are about to pass on an extraordinary amount of capital. Roughly $124 trillion is expected to change hands through inheritance by 2048. About $105 trillion of that goes directly to their heirs. What you're looking at is a projection of how even modest allocation preferences translate into enormous flows over time. Based on current data, that transfer alone could drive 90 to 180 billion into Bitcoin as early as next year. And over the next decade, that number grows into the trillions. And by 2048, the cumulative inflows get truly hard to ignore. This isn't about convincing new people. It's about existing beliefs inheriting capital. Money doesn't come with instructions. It follows conviction. And millennials don't view Bitcoin as a speculative trade in the way that other generations do. They are increasingly viewing it as savings technology, as insurance, as a long-term hedge against a system they already don't trust.
You see, this is another example of why Bitcoin doesn't need a marketing campaign. It doesn't need universal agreement. And it definitely doesn't need to win an argument with gold or silver bugs. It just needs time because ownership is already shifting slowly, quietly, and structurally in one direction. And this is where the bigger picture finally snaps into focus. Gold and silver are doing exactly what they've always done. They're responding to stress. They're responding to debasement. They're responding to the slow erosion of trust in institutions. And to be clear, that doesn't make them wrong. But shiny rocks becoming the foundation of the monetary system again in the age of the internet, AI, and global digital settlement is deeply illogical. It's a solution from the past, reacting to a problem of the present. That's why these moves feel so dramatic right now. Gold and silver are reacting to the end of monetary credibility. Bitcoin is reacting to something different. It's reacting to the end of monetary permission, to a world where money no longer needs to ask. Where settlement doesn't rely on trust and where scarcity is enforced by rules, not belief. So yes, silver isn't wrong, gold isn't wrong. They're just early warning signs. And historically, Bitcoin always moves last. Not because it's weaker, but because it's harder to understand. And once it finally moves, it rarely gives you enough time to catch up.
But now I want to hear from you. Do you think silver is the real warning sign this cycle? Could a giant silver short squeeze be the Lehman Brothers moment for the entire fiat Ponzi? And if you currently only hold gold or silver, what would convince you to allocate to Bitcoin? Drop your thoughts in the comments. And if this episode helped you see the bigger picture, maybe share it with someone who's all in on silver. And subscribe to the Swan Bitcoin channel so you don't miss what comes next. Because in a world relearning what money is, it's becoming more and more clear that there is no second best.