The Middle East has a chance to become “the Switzerland of the 21st century” by embracing bitcoin-backed banking, credit and digital money, Strategy (MSTR) Executive Chair Michael Saylor said.
In a wide-ranging presentation at Bitcoin MENA, Saylor urged the region to seize what he described as a $200 trillion opportunity by enabling banks to store bitcoin, offer BTC-backed credit and eventually launch return-generating digital money products.
“If you’re interested in making your nation the digital banking capital of the world … if you want to be the Switzerland of the 21st century, these are three ideas: the big, the bigger, and the biggest,” Saylor told the audience.
One “big idea,” Saylor said, was for sovereign wealth funds to invest in bitcoin. A “bigger idea” was to build banks that handle bitcoin and extend credit on it. The “biggest” idea was to create digital money accounts backed by BTC credit instruments offering up to 8% returns with no volatility.
“You don’t want to draw a little bit of bitcoin,” Saylor said. “You’re actually going to pull billions and tens and hundreds of billions and trillions of dollars of capital from people who don’t understand bitcoin.”
Saylor argued that the US is now leading the global regulatory shift towards bitcoin, pointing to what he described as near-unanimous support from government officials. “There is a deep consensus among everyone who runs the United States,” he said. “Donald J. Trump says he’s intent on making America the bitcoin superpower, crypto capital of the world, leader in digital assets.”
He added that he had spoken personally with the vice president, the treasury secretary, the head of the SEC, the commerce secretary and other top officials, all of whom, Saylor argued, consider bitcoin a strategic asset.
Saylor also said that US banks that once refused to touch bitcoin are now actively moving to support it.
“All the major banks in the US have gone from not banking bitcoin 12 months ago to, in the last six months, I’ve been approached by BNY Mellon, by Wells Fargo, by Bank of America, by Charles Schwab, by JPMorgan, by Citi,” he said. “They all start issuing credit against either Bitcoin or against Bitcoin derivatives like IBIT.”
Strategi has more than 660,000 BTC and now issues a variety of BTC-backed credit instruments, including perpetual preferred shares and short-term notes that pay monthly dividends.
“We convert 120 months or 240 months duration into one month,” he said. “Pay me now.”
Saylor framed these innovations as the foundation of a new kind of financial system. “Digital capital creates digital credit and digital credit creates digital money,” he said. “It’s the killer app.”
