patrick.net

Domestic Silver!

Metal for the public, banknotes for banks, foreigners, and large corporations where 5% of all transactions of the company AND including it's wholly owned subsidiaries is international transfers. Metal coins can't be exported, they have to be converted to Paper or Digital Silver Certificates.

After all, banks and big money loves paper for the people, but the physical for themselves, so they won't mind this switcheroo since they're constantly telling us through history that digital and paper and other representations are as good as the real thing. The compromise is that they have the representations they assure us is safe and as good as the real thing, and have the digital and paper that's easier to move and store and track for them. The public takes on the burden of holding and using the heavy silver coins to provide relief to the big institutions. ;)

TPTB don't allow me to have an account on 'X'. Probably because I sometimes post things that just shouldn't be common knowledge.

A few years ago, anyone could inquire about how much silver the Federal Reserve held. I remember it being 25k tonnes.

Here's a website listing it as 23k tonnes.about 739 million ounces

https://www.jmbullion.com/investing-guide/facts/silver-reserves-by-country

When you ask the Google it comes up with this The Federal Reserve holds 16 million units of silver, which is a small amount compared to the total reserves and holdings of other precious metals. The silver is included in the U.S. Treasury's monetary assets. While the Fed holds silver, it is not considered a primary component of their reserves.

GROK says that the Federal Reserve losing or disposing of 25k tonnes of silver is a conspiracy theory. Since I am the only one asking about this, my question apparently triggered a Deep State response.

IMHO unelected bureaucrats gave America's 23k tonnes of silver to rich, connected bankers for our own good.

Misc says

23k tonnes of silver

"Tonnes" is an odd unit of measure, typically used by the same folks who give their body weight in "stones." Americans typically measure silver in troy ounces.

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill on Tuesday that would recognize gold and silver as legal tender in the state, paving a path for Floridians to use the commodities in payment transactions.

The bill, HB 999, starts the process of allowing government or private entities, such as businesses, to voluntarily accept gold and silver as a form of debt payment. The bill also outlines sales tax exemptions on the purchase of the precious metals if they meet the purity requirements or if the sale of the gold or silver exceeds $500.

HB 999 is set to go into effect on July 1, 2026, if the Florida Legislature ratifies the rules to implement the bill before then.

In a statement on X announcing the bill's signing, DeSantis said the move was to ensure the state's financial sovereignty.

"Florida stands firmly for freedom, economic self-determination, and resistance to government overreach," the governor said. "But for too long, outdated regulations and unnecessary sales taxes have made it impractical for Floridians to enter the gold and silver market."

https://www.businessinsider.com/florida-gold-silver-legal-tender-ron-desantis-currency-2025-5

Florida's recognition of the gold and silver follows in the footsteps of states like Utah, which implemented a law in 2011 to recognize gold and silver as legal tender and exempt coins from state taxes.

The Florida bill states that gold coins must have 99.5% purity and silver coins must have 99.9% purity to be recognized as legal tender.

The coins must also be stamped with their weight and purity, according to the bill.

Sounds good to me!

They did the same thing here in Arizona. I was thinking of paying my income tax with some gold and silver, but decided the tax fellas would get uppity about it and audit me just for the hell of it.

fdhfoiehfeoi says

I took Apple and the past 10 years. Price has gone up about 82%. Inflation as a calculation of the rate of growth of the money supply(CPI is shit), is 46% during that period. That means a realized gain of 36%. Now, if you look at the price of physical silver over that same period, it has increased about the same amount(and metals are highly suppressed).

So what does this mean? In terms of real money, your stock investments didn't gain shit. But since our economy is built on Monopoly money, and fucking no one accounts for taxes, and especially not inflation, they see more zeros and assume they've made a profit.

You aren't making more, and stuff isn't more expensive. The money is just worth-less...

Since you wrote the above in April 2024, I looked at Apple stock April 2014 and April 2024. The values were, roughly, $20 and $170. So the gain is (170-20) / 20 = 750%, or 13.3% compounded yearly. So, this particular stock did very well during that period. (And that is why I am now retired!)

But I doubt cherry-picking a single stock was your intention. Let's look at the S&P500 over that time: $1883 --> $5035. That's 167% increase. Plus, if you held the S&P you would have collected dividends as well. So, I think it's fair to say the S&P handily outpaced the money supply increase.

Getting back to your Apple example, a 82% gain reduced by an increase of 46% in the money supply does not mean a gain of 82% - 46% = 36%. I don't think that's the right math. If you had a dollar that experienced 82% nominal gain you now have nominal $1.82. But an old dollar now needs to be $1.46 to buy the same goods because of the increase in money supply. So that $1.82 is now worth $1.82/1.46 = $1.25 in the uninflated currency. I suppose I just strengthened your important point!

But also, as you alluded to, the government unfairly taxes the nominal gain instead of the actual gain. That was supposed to be addressed in Trump 1.0 tax cuts of 2018 and was again floated for Trump 2.0 but failed to make the bill either time. The idea is to only tax the real capital gains, not the nominal ones. It takes nearly no additional effort to implement, too, since we already have to tell the government the purchase and sale dates of our investments; use those dates to adjust the buy and sell prices to real prices and tax that.

Since this is (was) primarily a real-estate site, I'll close in commenting that taxing the real gains of real-estate would be an eye-opener for a lot of people. My mother still touts her amazing house investment, which my parents bought in 1965 for $36k and is now worth $925k. In nominal terms, that's 5.6% compounded yearly nominal appreciation. However, adjusting that $36k to modern terms sets the house basis at $366k. So that house appreciated at a compound annual real rate of 1.5% — hardly a windfall.

Right, the stock market is almost always a better bet than the housing market.

Wow, this is great!

https://www.coffeeandcovid.com/p/gifts-and-grifts-monday-june-30-2025

Yesterday, AInvest News ran a story headlined, “Texas Authorizes Gold, Silver as Legal Tender for Daily Transactions.” Texas’s comptroller announced that Governor Greg Abbott signed a new law making gold and silver legal tender in that state:

https://x.com/DonHuffines/status/1937130290029240630

@DonHuffines
Good morning, Patriots! Great news: Governor Abbott has signed
transactional gold and silver into law.

As Comptroller, I will lead the implementation of Texas' new gold- and
silver-backed transactional currency system through the Texas Bullion
Depository to offer secure, inflation-resistant alternatives to the U.S.
dollar.

I'll ensure this system is secure, transparent, and accessible, with real-
time pricing, fraud protection, and no government tracking or central
bank control. I will protect your right to financial sovereignty, making
Texas the national leader in sound money.

https://www.ainvest.com/news/texas-authorizes-gold-silver-legal-tender-daily-transactions-2506/

The Lone Star State joined Florida, Utah, and Arkansas in the move, which to be clear, is a frontal assault on traditional banking. Banks, after all, are just middlemen. They hold our money for us, and send it off to people we buy things from.

The new state laws like Texas’s are setting up systems where state depositories, not banks, will hold the gold, and citizens can still use debit cards to buy and sell stuff. But in this case, they’ll be using an asset-backed currency that isn’t subject to inflationary taxes like fiat currency (such as the dollar).

The ‘trick’ —the politically difficult part— is exempting precious metals from state sales taxes. When traded metals are taxed, they remain a product rather than a currency. Strip off the taxes, and folks can swap gold and silver (even digitally) for other products or services without paying for the privilege.

Lots of questions remain. For instance, can citizens use state-based, digital gold to buy things across state lines? The Constitution suggests yes, but it’s never been tested. States must recognize each others’ court judgments, but not, for example, driver’s licenses. That’s voluntary. The federal Congress holds the power of the purse.

The bottom line is, we don’t know yet.

The Tenth Amendment provides that powers not delegated to the federal government are reserved to the states or the people. The Constitution prohibits states from coining money, but explicitly allows them to use gold and silver coin as legal tender (Art. I, Sec. 10). Texas can also enter into mutual currency agreements with other states, just as they do with mutual driver’s license recognition.

This is a fascinating and slowly forming test case for constitutional federalism in finance. If Texas and the other states play it right—with enough gold, a functional app, and strategic alliances —and maybe a little help from Congress— it won’t topple the dollar, but it could give the banks their first competition since the Federal Reserve was founded.

So… keep on debanking people, dummies. The banks are making their own demise politically possible.

Patrick says

The ‘trick’ —the politically difficult part— is exempting precious metals from state sales taxes. When traded metals are taxed, they remain a product rather than a currency. Strip off the taxes, and folks can swap gold and silver (even digitally) for other products or services without paying for the privilege.

I don't think it does shit for the Feds taxing capital gains every time you sell gold in any transaction. Even if it is gold to gold.

Patrick says

“Texas Authorizes Gold, Silver as Legal Tender for Daily Transactions.”

Doesn't "legal tender" mean one MUST accept it as payment? So, if you price an old car at $1900, you must accept the 1 oz Saudi gold square I offer as payment. If you are selling a hamburger for $5.50, you must accept my 1962 quarter as payment.

HeadSet says

Doesn't "legal tender" mean one MUST accept it as payment?

For debts & taxes, yes.

HeadSet says

So, if you price an old car at $1900, you must accept the 1 oz Saudi gold square I offer as payment. If you are selling a hamburger for $5.50, you must accept my 1962 quarter as payment.

No.

Example, you go to a hot dog stand, buy a hot dog right then and there. That's a transaction. Technically, legal tender doesn't apply.

You go to a restaurant, sit down, order a meal (could be a hot dog, even)..wait for it, get it...then get the bill 'for goods and services rendered'. That's a debt, technically. Legal tender applies.

Interesting to note, checks and credit cards are not legal tender technically. Only Federal Reserve Notes and US minted coins are.

If you offer legal tender currency to pay a debt even if the creditor wants some other form of payment, the mere offering of said legal tender currency discharges that debt, anyway. Contracts are exempted from this (see below).

Formal contracts can specify other forms of payment. Legal tender then does not apply. Of course, contract law can restrict certain forms of payment...such as the FDR law abolishing gold clauses in contracts.

Congress has granted the States the right to expand upon what is legal tender or not in their jurisdiction, as well.

MolotovCocktail says

Example, you go to a hot dog stand, buy a hot dog right then and there. That's a transaction. Technically, legal tender doesn't apply.

You go to a restaurant, sit down, order a meal (could be a hot dog, even)..wait for it, get it...then get the bill 'for goods and services rendered'. That's a debt, technically. Legal tender applies.

Right, a merchant can refuse cash in advance of the purchase, but once you have a debt, the merchant must accept Federal Reserve Notes as payment. FRNs are utterly worthless in themselves, but have worth because others must accept them for debts and because the government requires them to pay taxes.