Bizarro World Episode 143: The Crypto Cycle

       

 

Gerardo discusses the recent breakout in gold to back over $1,800 per ounce as the Fed continues to lose credibility and the public sees through the lies of "transitory inflation".

Gold isn't the only thing adding value in the face of fast-rising asset prices that are a result of rampant money printing...

Copper is approaching $5.00 per pound, and related stocks are doing very well... especially if you had the foresight to get in early.

Cryptos are also on the move, with Bitcoin now over $65,000.

We'll soon be launching a new premium publication called Crypto Cycle. It's being edited by Chris Curl, who's made 75X his money in the space.

Get to know Chris a bit in this episode. 

Table of Contents 

1:22 Gold, Copper, Bitcoin
6:56 How to Profit from Non-Transitory Inflation
10:00 Introducing Chris Curl's Crypto Cycle: Cryptocurrencies, Altcoins, Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)


Gerardo Del Real: Is Elon dead? No Elon's rich and apparently pays his taxes. Gold, back from the dead. Not so boring. We'll get into the gold price action. Also, some pretty, pretty attractive M&A out there. Newcrest coming in, taking Pretium out for $3.2 billion. Silver had itself a heck of a week, $25 was breached and it did so alongside a rising dollar. I am Gerardo Del Real, all by my lonesome this week. Mr. Nick Hodge is out on a well-deserved break. So it's me, myself, and I for episode 143 of Bizarro World. However, I will have a guest on later on today, Mr. Chris Curl. A gentleman that took his bit of money and multiplied it 75-fold in the crypto space. Excited to have Chris on. I am extremely impressed that he was willing to come on with me ranting and raving all on my own today. Always a tricky endeavor for those of you that have been listening to this podcast for quite some time, but let's get right into it.

Gold, Copper, Bitcoin

Gold closed at $1,865. Heck of a week. We talked last week, Nick and I did, about how positive I thought the Friday trading action was where gold moved higher and it moved higher alongside the dollar. Now, the dollar index at the time broke 94. The dollar here had itself a hell of a week. It just breached the 95 markets at 95.11 as we speak. Silver, of course, which always either overshoots to the upside or overshoots to the downside, had itself a hell of a week, $25.30 as of Friday's closing price. And copper's looking very, very strong, $4.53. I see $5 in the cards there very soon. I've said all quarter long, Q3, that Q4 was going to be the quarter where gold broke out.

Not there yet. We're going to have some overhead resistance at the $1,900 level, but if it breaches that, we're going to close the year above $2,000. And then I think 2022 is going to ring with it all-time highs. So far so good, let's see if the price action continues. Same in the copper space. I think $5 copper is right around the corner. And I think 2022 is going to be a heck of a year. Following 2021 that's been really, really profitable for those of us that have been in the space and positioned correctly. Bitcoin sitting here at $64,000. Touched new all-time highs. The major US indices, I don't have to tell you about those. Those continue to rise. The NASDAQ did snap a five-week win streak, but look, it's all systems go. Even the pullbacks now seem mild, half a percent pullback, 1% pullback in the major US indices.

So a lot to like in the gold space, a lot to like in the copper space. Let's get into some companies. There were a couple of names that we threw out last week that we thought would have good weeks. Patriot Battery Metals (CSE: PMET) did not produce assays this week. So I believe now the assays are coming. But despite that it had itself a hell of a week, it ended all up 25%. I believe the company's on to a new lithium discovery. I never like to see assays delayed. However, given the nature of the labs of the delays that everyone in the space is experiencing, it doesn't seem out of place. I think we'll know more next week, but Patriot Battery Metals finally seems to be gaining some traction on good volume as well. So, that's one to look at.

Another one that we mentioned was Kutcho Copper (TSX-V: KC)(OTC: KCCFF). And Kutcho Copper just announced results of its feasibility study on its high grade copper zinc project. The numbers were absolutely fantastic. The market being what the market is, initially actually sold off on the news. And I reached out to the company. I reached out to Vince, the CEO, Vince Sorace, and he said initially he did get some pushback about the CapEx, the initial capital cost of $483 million dollars. Let me be very blunt everybody, I don't think Vince is in this to build this. I think Vince gets taken out here within the next, I don't know, nine to 12 months, and I think it happens in the $3 range. So lots of upside. Look, Nick had a subscribers position in the high $0.20s. I believe I had subscribers in there for year is at the C$0.30 level. I had a subscriber that reached out and sent a very nice note, said that he listened when I recommended that people buy it at the lows and he bought it at C$0.19 cents, bought 150,000 shares, and reached out to thank me.

So I love to hear those stories. For those that took advantage of the lows in the uranium space, the copper space, congratulations, go do something nice for yourself. We're getting a similar setup in gold. Let's go over the Kutcho Copper feasibility study numbers. I mentioned the CapEx of $483 million. Well, context matters everyone, and using today's spot price of $4.50 a pound and $1.57 zinc, the after tax NPV discounted at 7% is $931 million or 41% IRR. Again, 41% IRR, $931 million dollars NPV at a 7% discount. Production cash costs are low, $1.11 a pound of copper equivalent. Eleven-year open pit and underground mine life. Tons of exploration upside. We're looking at metal production of 533 million pounds of copper, 841 million pounds of zinc, 10.6 million ounces of silver, and 129,700 ounces of gold. Congratulations to Vince, congratulations to the team at Kutcho. Again, I think here in the next year or so, this company is taken out. There's a couple of very natural suitors that I think would love to own this deposit. And I think they'd be happy to pay $3 a share for it. We'll see how that pans out.

How to Profit from Non-Transitory Inflation

Nick and I, every week we talk about inflation, we talk about wealth inequality. We've been banging the drum on that for years on end before it was sticky. It's very clear folks that this is not transitory anymore. South Korean import prices are up 35.8%. Argentina's inflation rate is 52.1%. German wholesale prices are up 15.2%. That's the highest since 1974. So I don't know what else we can highlight to you all to convince team transitory that none of this is transitory, but I believe it's at least becoming evident to most people with a brain that this is probably going to end badly.

And so, again, as Mr. Hodge would say if he was here, use the backdrop and the macro situation to generate some inflation profits. This is not the time to be sitting in cash. This is the time to put that cash to work. You get ideas from this free podcast every week. Nick has paid publications. I have paid publications. We own a publishing company that's dedicated to giving free advice and also, on the subscription end, providing research and insights on ideas that we think can be profitable and things that we're doing as well. So, look, there's always a risk to everything. One of the biggest risks to wealth right now or to becoming wealthier, rich in this country is doing nothing. So, again, I'm going to sound like a broken record, this is not the time to be doing nothing.

Get in the game. Shameless plug, you want free information, go to dailyprofitcycle.com. You want more free information that's sponsor paid and based, go to resourcestockdigest.com. You want research and insights for trading purposes, you can go to digestpublishing.com. I write a letter there that trades in and out of positions. I have a longer-term service that takes a cyclical view of the markets. And then we have an accredited investor service generating deals on a private basis for accredited investors. And I got to say, the first several deals have been fantastic. The results on those thus far have been great and no shortage of ideas or deal flow, I'm betting stuff every single day. And a lot of very attractive deals available right now that I'm excited to bring to you.

Nick, as you know, is sector agnostic. While I just dabble in the resource space, he goes where the puck is on everything. And so, again, there's no excuse not to get educated, not to be informed, not to be in the game. I'll leave that there. I want to be brief this week because I want to allow my guest, Mr. Chris Curl, the opportunity to give me a primer on all things crypto. And so without further ado, Mr. Chris Curl. Chris, great to have you on. How are you doing?

Introducing Chris Curl's Crypto Cycle: Cryptocurrencies, Altcoins, Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)

Chris Curl: Doing good, Gerardo, thanks for having me on.

Gerardo Del Real: Have you ever listened to this podcast?

Chris Curl: I actually have. Yeah. I have.

Gerardo Del Real: I admire your bravery in coming on, especially on a week where the adult supervision is gone. As I was mentioning to everyone, Nick is out on a well deserved break. So thank you so much for coming on.

Look, you're someone, and I mentioned this earlier, but it's worth touching on again, that did something that not very many people, very few people ever do in their life, you took a number, pick a number, whatever the number is, but you took an amount of dollars and in a relatively short amount of time multiplied that by, I believe it was what, 75 times.

Chris Curl: That's correct. Yeah.

Gerardo Del Real: In the crypto space?

Chris Curl: Yes. That's right.

Gerardo Del Real: Again, that's not something that's common. Anyone that knows Nick and I know that we are big fans of eating our own cooking. And by that we mean we often write checks for companies that we recommend, companies that we take on as sponsors on the Resource Stock Digest side. We believe in putting our money where our mouth is. We're not journalists that just watch from a distance or watch from the sidelines and don't actually have a financial incentive on these ideas working. So when I heard what you were able to do, obviously Nick and I with the publishing company thought we got to talk to Chris and we got to get a better understanding of how the heck he's doing this.

And so before we get into how you did it and some of your background, I have to say to everyone how excited we are to launch your new service here at the end of the month. And we'll of course provide more details as we get closer to that launch date, but let's get right into it. I am no crypto expert. I laugh. I think it's hilarious that there's CumRockets and there's Uniswap's and there's unicorns and there's Papi's and Mammies and all sorts of "amies". That's what the cryptos face on that side of it looks like to me. Now, when it comes to the stablecoins, the bitcoins, the ether, I understand those a bit more, but only as a hard asset trader, only from the perspective of someone that knows what it's like when there's a finite amount of something and a lot of capital being printed to chase it.

So I say all that to say, tell us a bit about your background and just how you got involved in this space, and then let's share with everybody how the heck you made all that money.

Chris Curl: Sure. Well, I'm a pretty regular guy. In my late teens and 20s, I definitely worked my fair share of Joe jobs. I was not somebody in the financial world really. For the last about 10 or 15 years, done professional videography and video production. So, that was a way to keep the lights on for a while. But really, as far as the crypto goes, I had my eye on Bitcoin's last bull run, which peaked out in about 2018 when Bitcoin hit $20,000. I was very much keeping my eye on it, but I knew that it was going to crash pretty hard, so I was too scared to really put my money in at that time. And of course, it did shortly after I saw the bubble there. But really it was this year. It was just all of the aspects of the coronavirus and the lockdowns and the stimulus packages.

Gerardo Del Real: All a lot of stimulus.

Chris Curl: Yes. The government is printing billions of dollars by 2021, handing out all of the unemployment stimulus checks, forcing businesses to close and people to stay home and not work. So you just had all this money chasing fewer goods and services because everything was shut down. It was very obvious to me at the end of 2020 that inflation was just... I didn't see how inflation wasn't going to be a huge problem. And I didn't know how the US dollar was going to be able to maintain the value that it had. So, that happened. At the same time I saw, boy, bitcoin is taking off. Bitcoin's at $40,000. Ethereum's at $1,200. I had all this money sitting in my checking and savings account, felt like an absolute fool for not having some money in the crypto market, because all I'm doing is losing the money that I have, whatever money I have, I'm losing the value of the money.

Gerardo Del Real: I just got done imploring everyone about this is not the time to do nothing. Neither was that. That was not out the time to do nothing and just sit on cash.

Chris Curl: I had been a fool for doing nothing for the last year. It was a big misstep and I wasn't going to make that mistake again, not going into the future. So I started looking at the crypto markets. I started looking at altcoins and smallcap coins and things that I thought were undervalued, because obviously Bitcoin and Ethereum, they still had a lot of room to go up. They weren't going to have 10X, 20X, 50X anytime in the near future. So I really started looking into some of these smalle cap altcoins to really try to make some money. But of course I do have bitcoin and Ethereum as well, those are very good investments and they're going to keep going up for the immediate future.

Gerardo Del Real: So when you say looking, when I look at a resource stock I know immediately the first thing that I do is I vet the share structure. I want to know how many pre-IPO shares were issued, at what price, are they escrowed, how many IPO shares were issued, who did they go to, at what price were they issued? And so I have my checklist on how to vet a resource company that you can apply to other sectors, of course. I've just done very well in the resource spase so I'm comfortable there. When I talk about CumRockets and Uniswap's and Papi's and all that, how do you look at a coin? Let's take a real world example. The ones that made you 75 times your money, what is it that you're looking at when you're evaluating the opportunity?

Chris Curl: Well, a lot of traditional technical analysis goes out the window when you're talking about crypto currency.

Gerardo Del Real: Absolutely.

Chris Curl: It's a very disruptive new form of finance and valuation. Bitcoin started in the height of the last great recession in 2008, when everyone could see how osified and corrupt the traditional financial system was. So obviously, boom, decentralized digital currency created something to break free from that. So a lot of the traditional methods, evaluating assets, don't necessarily apply. But I do think that if you're in an overall bull market, which bitcoin was definitely in the beginning of the year, and still is in today, you can look at a coin and see what its current price is relative to what other major coins have done. And you can also look at the potential use cases it has, as well as honestly you have to almost look at it's like what I call a 'meme potential' as far as how can this take on the public imagination through social media and through memes, because frankly that's where you've seen the largest gains this year, is in things like...

Gerardo Del Real: Like the CumRockets.

Chris Curl: Yeah. CumRockets or I think...

Gerardo Del Real: I just like saying CumRockets, Chris. Don't mind me.

Chris Curl: A couple weeks ago I think CumStar and ELONBALLS were two of the top performing small-cap meme coins.

Gerardo Del Real: Oh God, I love this so much.

Chris Curl: It is very disruptive. It is a deconstruction of the traditional financial system. But I do think if you can get a coin early enough, I don't think there's ever been a period in time where those kind of memes were really possible in that short a period of time. So it's a very exciting time. There's definitely a lot of speculation. It's definitely volatile. It is not low risk investing. But if you're willing to play with some extra money you've got, there's an incredible amount of money to be made.

Gerardo Del Real: It's funny that you say that you don't feel there's ever been a time in history where you could have these types of gains in the crypto space. And I say it's funny because I feel exactly the same way about the resource space. You have all of the tailwinds, you have all of the macro setups, and then if you can just educate yourself a bit about the opportunities and mitigate the risk as much as possible, yes, investing is risky, speculating is risky, and if you're going to speculate on ELONBALLS, then of course there's going to be some risk involved, but I agree with you 100% on that sentiment. So, again, back to my comment that Nick and I like to have skin in the game, we put our money where our mouths are and we like to vote with our dollars.

I will say this to everyone that's out there, you will be able to see Chris's returns because we're going to pony up $50,000 and we're going to let Chris manage it. And so I love the stock market. I love the resource space. I love owning multiple companies because it's a way to be accountable in a very measured way. There is no getting around underperforming or not performing, and there's also nothing like outperforming and delivering to subscribers and, and ourselves, 10 baggers, 15 baggers, 20 baggers, in your case, 75 baggers. That's exciting to me.

So we will be ponying up $50,000 here at the end of the month, everyone. Everyone that subscribes to Chris's service will be able see what that performance looks like. And I'm sure it's going to be a recurring theme here on Bizzaro World. I'm excited to see what you do with that, Chris. What should people be aware of that are going to listen to this and maybe are younger and just hardwired because it seems like the younger generation really understands the crypto space in a way that the older generation just can't right. Just wired completely different. Different generations. What would you say to someone young or old, but just somebody that's intrigued by the space and the potential to make 20, 40, 50, 75 times your money, any advice there?

Chris Curl: Well, the only advice I'd really give is that as long as crypto is in a bull market, there's a lot of money to be made. Even though there's volatility, if you put your money in the crypto market during a bull market, you're just going to have very good gains. And I see our current bull market lasting for, at the very least, another three months. And I'm anticipating that we hit the mania phase of the market sometime leading into the end of the year, beginning of 2022, where you really start just having parabolic gains. Because that's been a hallmark of every bitcoin and crypto bull market that we've had in the past.

Gerardo Del Real: A couple of things there, when you say the bull market has another three months, do you mean for the mania phase of it or for the overall bull market, do you believe that after three months it's done and it's a wrap for cryptos?

Chris Curl: Well, I think there's a very real risk of that for the short term after maybe that last blow-off top for bitcoin and the parabolic rise that we do see a prolonged bear market in crypto. That being said, the interesting thing about how the crypto market works is that you do have altcoins following bitcoin after bitcoin tops out, altcoins follow, and those can have a different trajectory and last longer and different coins can have different trajectories, but that's where most of the money is made, is in the altcoins. And that'll play out a little bit longer than bitcoin.

Gerardo Del Real: So, that's the opportunity. So what you're saying, your service is going to provide both, it's going to provide the exposure to the mania phase that you see coming in some of the more established names, but then you'll also give guidance on selling. And obviously, I'm hoping so because we're putting $50,000 of our own money up for you to do it.

Chris Curl: We're going to be selling.

Gerardo Del Real: So guidance on when to sell and then guidance on when to rotate hopefully profits into altcoins that have a longer-term trajectory. Is that accurate?

Chris Curl: That's very accurate. Yeah.

Gerardo Del Real: Interesting.

Chris Curl: I think it's just a no-brainer to put money into the crypto market right now. I've had so many coins that, back in March and April, gave me 10X, 20X. That's very common for an altcoin to do in a bitcoin bull market. So it's a no-brainer for me. I'm excited to get other people involved.

Gerardo Del Real: We're excited to have you on board. We're excited to launch the service. Full disclosure up until this point, I've never bought any kind of coin other than a gold coin. I'm excited to actually have some skin in the game and actually get some of my personal capital on the table as well and follow along. I think junior resource stocks being my area of expertise and where my level of comprehension, I feel I'm wired for that. The risk-reward profile always excites me in the resource space. And I think if it plays out the way that you think it's going to play out, Chris, it's going to be a fun and profitable couple of years.

I'd say for people that are out there listening that are wondering why copper's near all-time highs, everything is surging and the stock market keeps surging and cryptos keep surging... you have to remember the last time we had inflation like this, you could just take your money and go park it in bonds and get 16%. Now, you don't have that choice. Like you mentioned, are you going to keep your cash in the bank and get what? I don't even know what banks pay because I hate money sitting. I joke with Nick all the time that I am not a fan of large pools of capital just sitting there not allocated. And you got to put it to work, but no, no, I think we're in for a fun couple of years. Anything to add to that, Chris? This has been great. Any other tips that you would give? Maybe a freebie between now and the end of the month, something that people can do due diligence on?

Chris Curl: Oh, well, there's a lot to talk about. Just piggybacking on what you said, it's very obvious that the government, they're losing control of the narrative surrounding inflation. The cat's out of the bag, everyone knows what's going on. And it does appear, at least for the short term, that bitcoin is the preferred inflation hedge, and it's probably going to continue that way for at least a little while. So people are going to be looking for alternative assets, that's not going away, but as far as any picks.

Gerardo Del Real: Give me one that you like right now.

Chris Curl: Oh my gosh. I have so many picks that I like. Well, one that I recommended to Nick was Solana and that is essentially a blockchain that is competing with Ethereum, but basically can do everything Ethereum can much quicker and with much lower fees. And that includes NFTs, which are huge right now. A lot of people are reticent to use Ethereum because the fees are so high, whereas with blockchain like Solana, you can effectively do the same things Ethereum does much, much cheaper, and faster.

Gerardo Del Real: All right. So Solana. And that's all you guys are going to get out there. We'll provide the link to Chris's service here at the end of the month and y'all can sign up and hopefully make a bunch of money alongside of Chris and myself and Nick and the company. We're excited for the product. It's called Crypto Cycle. We're excited to work with you, Chris. I'm personally excited because this is the first time I dabble in the crypto space and in a space where I really feel like an amateur, and so I'm looking forward to seeing what my amateur self can do under your guidance here.

Chris Curl: It's fun. It's a nascent asset class. There isn't really an established orthodoxy. It's all-new. And we're early. I'm amazed how many people I speak to, people who are professional investment advisors, people who work in finance, who hardly know anything about it. So, that shows us how early we are in the space.

Gerardo Del Real: Let me ask you this before I let you go. How do you feel about NFTs? Are you playing that at all?

Chris Curl: Sometimes when I look at NFTs I definitely am reminded of the dot-com bubble and Beanie Babies a little bit, with some of these JPEG's selling for millions of dollars. But I think that there are some NFT sets that will maintain value. I do see there's a lot of utility for non-fungible tokens, but I do think there's a lot of overvaluation when it comes to the sets that are coming out or the pictures of different vampires or pixel art or rocks or whatever you want to call them. I would have a lot of trouble recommending anyone buy into those at such insanely high valuation.

Gerardo Del Real: I would have a lot of trouble watching you put $50,000 on a picture of a pixelated rock.

Chris Curl: These things are going for millions.

Gerardo Del Real: Oh yeah. We saw. We talked about it. I think it sold for $3.4 million or something like that a few months ago. Again, I would still have a lot of trouble seeing $50,000 allocated to a picture of a pixelated rock.

Chris Curl: I couldn't recommend that they put that kind of money into it a JPEG.

Gerardo Del Real: I love it. Chris, it's been an absolute blast having you on. Everybody, I am Gerardo Del Real. You've met Christopher Curl. This was episode 143 of Bizzaro World. Adult Supervision will be back next week. Have a great week everybody.

This transcript is unedited. Please excuse grammatical errors and run-on sentences.