Michael Saylor, Executive Chairman of Strategy (MSTR), said the Middle East has the opportunity to become the “Switzerland of the 21st century” by embracing Bitcoin-backed banking, credit and digital money.
In a wide-ranging presentation at Bitcoin MENA, Thaler urged the region to seize what he described as a $200 trillion opportunity by allowing banks to store Bitcoin, offer Bitcoin-backed credit, and ultimately launch digital money products that generate yield.
“If you are interested in making your country the digital banking capital of the world… if you want to be the Switzerland of the 21st century, these are the three ideas: big, bigger and biggest,” Thaler told the audience.
Saylor said the “big idea” is for sovereign wealth funds to invest in Bitcoin. The “bigger idea” was to create a bank to store Bitcoin and extend its credit. The “biggest” idea was to create a digital money account backed by a BTC credit product, offering up to 8% yield without volatility.
“You won’t be able to withdraw any Bitcoin,” Saylor said. “The reality is that you’re going to extract billions, tens of billions, hundreds of billions, trillions of dollars from people who don’t understand Bitcoin.”
Saylor argued that the United States is currently leading the global regulatory shift toward Bitcoin, noting that it has near-unanimous support from government officials. “There’s a deep consensus among everyone who runs America,” he said. “Donald J. Trump says he intends to make America a Bitcoin superpower, the world’s crypto capital and a leader in digital assets.”
He added that he has personally spoken with the Vice President, Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of the SEC, Secretary of Commerce, and other senior officials, but Saylor insisted that all of them view Bitcoin as a strategic asset.
Saylor also said that U.S. banks, which previously refused to get involved in Bitcoin, are now actively supporting it.
“All of the major U.S. banks stopped accepting Bitcoin 12 months ago, but in the past six months we have been approached by BNY Mellon, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Charles Schwab, JPMorgan, and Citi,” he said. “They’re all starting to issue credits either against Bitcoin or against Bitcoin derivatives like IBIT.”
Strategy holds over 660,000 BTC and currently issues a variety of BTC-backed credit products, including perpetual preferred stocks and short-term bonds that pay monthly dividends.
“We’re converting a period of 120 or 240 months into a month,” he said. “Please pay now.”
Thaler framed these innovations as the foundation for a new kind of financial system. “Digital capital creates digital credit, and digital credit creates digital money,” he said. “That’s the killer app.”
