Western Standard - It starts with Gold

00:00:00.000 China's killing our canola.

00:00:07.360 Forty-five billion dollars gone.

00:00:10.500 Western farmers bleed.

00:00:12.980 Mark Carney?

00:00:14.720 Silent.

00:00:16.260 Made millions off Beijing's dime.

00:00:19.300 He won't fight.

00:00:20.420 He's Beijing's banker, not our prime minister.

00:00:30.000 hello western standard viewers my name is sean polzer and i am the business and energy reporter

00:00:49.280 here at the western standard where we try to bring you all the news and views and events

00:00:55.840 from a uniquely western standard and we western perspective and we're going to start doing that

00:01:01.120 with uh business and and money we thought it would be kind of a good idea because seeing how calgary

00:01:07.040 is the business capital of canada and the energy center one of the major energy centers of the

00:01:13.280 world so hopefully this is going to be a weekly um i conversation is how i would like to put it

00:01:22.160 with guests and some movers and shakers here and not just from the energy world but from all the

00:01:28.000 other business sectors that make our community here in calgary so that would include agriculture

00:01:34.640 transportation and calgary is home to some of the biggest names in canada and it is a major

00:01:39.040 corporate center so we are going to try and shed a little more light on it and bring it a little

00:01:46.320 more down to earth sometimes when you're dealing with these business stories it's comes at you

00:01:51.200 from a very high level and we're going to try to bring it down and onto a very personal level.

00:01:56.080 A little bit about me. I have been, and I'm Edmontonian, don't hold it against me,

00:02:02.560 born and raised. I came to Calgary in 1999 during the Y2K crisis at the moment. The world didn't end. 0.98

00:02:11.440 I wound up staying here in Calgary. I've been here for 25 years as a business and energy reporter

00:02:17.360 covering the upstream industry here in Calgary which I'm sure that most of you

00:02:22.080 have been associated with one way or another. My grandparents were farmers out in Manitola.

00:02:28.400 My uncle was a dairy farmer so we're all very western and it's very ingrained here

00:02:34.880 at the Western Centre as you well know. So we've got a lot to talk about given some of the

00:02:40.880 developments with tariffs and trade and the federal election and just in the middle of it

00:02:46.320 all how your portfolio is doing i don't know about yours but i know mine is pretty much underwater

00:02:52.560 i've got a list of calgary-based canadian companies here that we're going to keep track of

00:02:57.680 including but not limited to people like telus tell us down today synovus down today atco down

00:03:06.800 today five bucks weed corporation and we've got weed in calgary canopy growth uh petro china they

00:03:15.280 have an office here we're looking at some uh canadian currencies my vacation index is up

00:03:21.040 canadian dollar up against the us it's up against the euro it's up against the mexican pay so so

00:03:27.760 we're all doing fine there and uh we're gonna look forward to coming weekly tuesdays here with

00:03:36.160 some guests i got john in the studio and just wanted to say welcome and we're gonna start off

00:03:42.880 our show with Julie Lemieux from Triple Point Resources. She's going to come in and talk to us

00:03:52.600 about salt domes off of Newfoundland. What does a salt dome have to do with energy in Calgary,

00:03:58.340 you may ask. Well, it takes a lot of engineering expertise, and we're also talking about hydrogen,

00:04:03.740 and hydrogen is going to be a major backbone of Alberta's future energy economy. That's

00:04:10.440 according to Premier Smith, who is a huge backer of it.

00:04:14.380 They do it a little bit differently on the East Coast than we do here,

00:04:17.160 but it is still an interesting story.

00:04:19.500 And after that, we are going to talk with Peter Merrick and Adrian Spitters,

00:04:24.560 the co-authors of It Starts With Gold,

00:04:27.240 to tell you how to maintain your personal sovereignty and your personal liberty

00:04:31.960 in these challenging financial times.

00:04:35.520 So I hope to stay with us, and we'll get right at it.

00:04:38.440 And we're here today with Julie Lemieux, the president of Triple Point Resources, which has an innovative energy solution for hydrogen out in Newfoundland.

00:04:56.160 Welcome, Julie, for our first episode.

00:04:59.620 Thank you for having me.

00:05:00.500 Our first guest.

00:05:01.460 Thank you.

00:05:02.180 uh we met uh last year at the petroleum show and we did a little interview and you kind of filled

00:05:07.060 me in on some of the things that were going on um the company has a salt dome special geological

00:05:14.420 feature which people petroleum geologists here in calgary would be familiar with yeah and they will

00:05:19.460 be excited about it as well and you're based in calgary yes precisely for that reason that the

00:05:24.820 energy expertise is here in calgary yeah and people know a lot about salt cavern storage

00:05:30.420 It's been used in the oil and gas a lot, and on the East Coast, in Newfoundland, we have a salt dome that's very unique.

00:05:39.360 It's the only one that is proven right now, and we want to develop it for making on-demand clean energy and creating a reserve of energy for Canada.

00:05:51.080 There's a lot of oil in Atlantic Canada, and we can harness every bit of it using salt cavern storage.

00:05:58.760 So that's why we want to develop it for clean energy.

00:06:03.840 Now, hydrogen, there's been a lot of talk about hydrogen and how it's going to fit in the energy mix.

00:06:11.060 And out west here, we're primarily concerned with making it from natural gas.

00:06:15.680 But out on the east, you can also make hydrogen from electrolysis, right?

00:06:19.980 Yes.

00:06:20.720 So your solution would be to take that energy and then store it in the salt dome?

00:06:26.480 So a salt dome, the beauty of it is very versatile.

00:06:31.060 And right now what we believe is we will store energy as a compressor energy storage.

00:06:37.600 So we can use the electron, the excess energy from the wind farms and store it on the ground.

00:06:44.140 So we can start accumulating that excess to use it for peak demand.

00:06:48.760 So the project that they're moving towards building massive, not salt cavern, but the wind farm,

00:06:56.480 field they they can have uh usage of that excess energy so it will stabilize the grid right uh

00:07:04.800 that's something that is very important if not you need to oversize your project to power yourself up

00:07:10.960 and we know that the renewable is not always available so how you will make it available

00:07:18.160 is to use salt cavern storage that's the low-winging fruit and it's well known like in the

00:07:22.880 oil and gas who's been using salt carbon storage for decades well like you said that's that's a

00:07:28.880 problem with renewable energy here in alberta is intermittent and uh the lack of storage like with

00:07:34.720 oil and gas you can put it in a tank right um so my understanding is that you know regardless of

00:07:41.280 what anybody thinks of renewable energy but the key to renewable energy is going to be this energy

00:07:46.320 storage so that you could and transportation as well right yeah that's that's really the missing

00:07:51.680 link to include more renewable energy into the energy mix. And we can also accumulate

00:07:59.160 hydrogen as well. So we can do so much with the salt cavern, but it will become very essential

00:08:06.600 to integrate all the power that we have from the wind out there. In the hydrogen sector,

00:08:14.380 we know that the green hydrogen is a very difficult market right now, but it will come.

00:08:20.700 like i just i'm just back from germany you can tell that they're moving uh towards having a lot

00:08:27.260 more hydrogen in their energy mix they're ready for that they have major projects that are moving

00:08:34.140 forward i think it's a bit slower than what we were expecting but we will be there for that as

00:08:39.500 well and and we can become a real export hub and that's why the the german uh and the european they

00:08:47.500 They are relying on trusted allies to provide them with more and more energy.

00:08:54.720 We can be there.

00:08:55.980 We have the wind.

00:08:57.360 We have salt cavern.

00:08:59.580 So that's the combination we need to be able to, like I said, I think we'll take care of our needs first.

00:09:06.800 And then we can think about exporting and continuing to be an energy powerhouse.

00:09:13.180 But this one, clean energy, I think it's very, very attractive.

00:09:16.660 I know that you're wearing your green hydrogen, and I'm wearing my blue hydrogen.

00:09:20.840 Yeah, exactly.

00:09:22.600 So this energy corridor, transatlantic energy corridor to Germany, this was one of the outcomes of the meeting between former Prime Minister Trudeau and the German Chancellor Olaf a couple years ago when they were talking about no business case for LNG.

00:09:37.840 So they went for hydrogen instead.

00:09:39.880 Yeah.

00:09:40.600 But you can put hydrogen on a boat and float it out to Europe, can't you, in the form of ammonia?

00:09:46.220 you can you can do that we see now that there is also methanol that are starting to gain traction

00:09:53.500 and there's uh you know the liquefied hydrogen i think it's a long shot it would be it would take

00:10:00.300 a lot more but there is liquid organic floating bombs yeah there's liquid organic that is also

00:10:07.340 gaining traction you have company here in calgary airton energy they're developing technology to

00:10:14.940 transport liquid organic hydrogen i think it's it's all those ideas we should not discard any of

00:10:22.140 them we need to try it and we it's amazing how we see the best engineer in the world looking at

00:10:31.180 finding solution to integrate more renewable more clean energy and and now it start to you know you

00:10:38.540 start to have big stride between university here in canada in in europe and uh technology is

00:10:45.980 advancing very quickly sure so for us the fact that the hydrogen sector is not let's say moving

00:10:52.540 as quick for the green uh product because it's still very expensive right um i think the technology

00:10:59.660 is advancing so much quicker now we have electrolyzers that are twice as good as the

00:11:05.900 one from two years ago so it's coming and we'll be there for that so to be clear you're not in the

00:11:12.600 business of manufacturing hydrogen and you're it's just storage at this point yes so you're

00:11:18.400 kind of like the intermediary though yeah we're the kind of the mid-streamer the mid-streamer

00:11:23.020 okay that's i like that but one thing that we can all agree on we may agree or not on the green

00:11:30.700 hydrogen and the future of it but one thing we agreed on is we need more power sure and the

00:11:36.700 power line is just above our head official so the dome is very well positioned on the trans canada

00:11:44.860 highway the power line is just above our head we're 30 kilometers from a major port there's a

00:11:51.900 second one as well we're like direct line 10 kilometers away from the ocean there's not that

00:12:00.460 much population around the the dome itself and the footprint we will have using salt cavern

00:12:07.180 storage is very minimal so it's i think it's something that needs to be in the mix for

00:12:13.500 the energy transition and we're we're happy to develop it so why did you choose calgary as

00:12:21.340 uh headquarters for the company well it's um it's the capital of energy for canada and there's also

00:12:30.380 it is also a place where you can find a lot of people from newfoundland and labrador there is

00:12:35.900 very true there is a lot lot lot of them and that's what i was uh for me targeting like having

00:12:43.500 people that understand oil and gas that can understand very quickly the advantage of salt

00:12:48.860 cavern storage and in finding individuals from Newfoundland and Labrador that maybe want to go

00:12:55.740 back home or they want to give a chance to Newfoundland and Labrador to have a good start

00:13:03.500 with with this asset where it can create new opportunities for people that are still there

00:13:11.100 and it's it's on the clean side of it so they they're very attracted by that so we have

00:13:16.140 two individuals at our office, Daryl Downey and Bill Bass, they were both with Suncor Energy,

00:13:25.180 and they retired from that. And I think the day they retire, they move and they would move

00:13:32.220 mountains for this project. So it's very interesting to have them with us.

00:13:36.780 So what kind of timelines are we talking about and what do you think the size of the market is

00:13:44.060 going to be you know like you said obviously it's it's a big growth area but nobody really knows

00:13:51.180 what the size of the prize yes but the size of the price for like i said for power

00:13:56.920 and power can come from compressor and can come from using hydrogen locally as well we don't need

00:14:03.660 to export it we can consume it locally and create more power for that grid so all the atlantic

00:14:10.400 region can access that, and we can integrate all the renewable from all the other provinces as well.

00:14:19.840 There's a lot of space in the Dome to scale over time, so we believe that if we have the green

00:14:28.000 light after environmental study, after good consultation with local population and local

00:14:35.120 communities in you know any time between four to five years we can be operational so i think

00:14:41.600 that makes it very interesting to be ready for 2030 where you know there's a lot of a lot of

00:14:47.840 provinces a lot of proof that make commitment for 2030 2035 let's see what's going on but this is

00:14:55.600 this is for uh the cost of a project like this compared to other way of bringing power to uh to

00:15:03.200 the grid like uh dam it can be quicker it's less money um and you know it stabilize the grid and

00:15:11.520 create more firm power over time with a very small footprint so it makes it very attractive

00:15:17.520 absolutely so in terms of um investment uh and and funding um where where do you guys sit with

00:15:24.800 that um you're still a private company we're still a private company uh at this stage we we plan to

00:15:32.240 go public at one time when the condition will be would be right uh so right now we are you know

00:15:39.600 like always looking at opportunity for non-dilutive uh investment if you want so there is some grant

00:15:48.000 available there is some loan you can have uh but we'll need to uh have more money coming in in the

00:15:56.720 company to pursue and then i i think there's a lot of interest on the future once the feasibility is

00:16:03.920 done there's a lot of company that can be interested to partner with us we're de-risking

00:16:09.440 a lot uh with local consultation very good relationship with the government the government

00:16:16.000 in newfoundland and labrador is highly supportive newfoundland hydro is highly supportive sure of

00:16:21.520 this project we just need to go through you know the the process complete the feasibility and then

00:16:27.200 we'll have a lot of funds private equity maybe but uh like the typical way of financing project true

00:16:35.840 is that another reason to be here in calgary it is one of the other reason i'm sure at one point

00:16:41.840 uh you know we will have we have a small office in st john's but we'll have an office closer to

00:16:47.440 the dome we have someone working there right now but opening an office locally will be something

00:16:53.120 that's very important and provide uh provide opportunities to local people something that's

00:17:00.080 very important for us as well and it's coming we just need to attach the financing complete the

00:17:06.000 feasibility and we are you know looking for great engineering firm from newfoundland and labrador to

00:17:12.880 be part of this excellent uh what about uh offshore interest is there interest from european

00:17:18.320 investors or say from the states yeah yeah we have uh right now part of our investor we have

00:17:24.880 investor from norway we have an investor from from london england uh we have investor from from the

00:17:32.640 state as well uh there is a lot of interest people that know about salt cavern storage they understand

00:17:39.360 and they believe this asset needs to be developed for the future for the transition so we need to

00:17:45.520 have to find more believers and i think we can find more believers here in canada um and this

00:17:52.400 project will be developed yeah like oil and gas people would know that salt dumps down in the gulf

00:17:58.400 of mexico am i allowed to call it the gulf of mexico but uh that's basically the oil slay yeah

00:18:04.080 they all yeah gulf coast that's how we get around it but it's also terms in louisiana and

00:18:10.400 south texas and in that whole area yeah and same thing in in europe they are very well aware of

00:18:17.120 salt cavern storage in germany they have hundreds of caverns in france they have a lot of caverns

00:18:23.120 as well it's part of their mandate to have uh energy reserve so they need to keep a reserve of

00:18:31.120 60 percent all the time right in in europe in the eu so they are very well aware of this so

00:18:37.680 the fact that we can offer them storage they can ask for stockpiling on this side of the ocean

00:18:45.280 that's something that is very intriguing for them but it starts to sink in they don't have

00:18:50.640 a lot of their salt cavern have been used for oil and gas purposes sure and now they're looking at

00:18:57.200 stockpiling off off-site and we we can be a site for them as well so what kind of dollar figures

00:19:04.880 are we talking about to get up and running in terms of a project is that public is that public

00:19:11.440 well we're we're just at the pre-feasibility level so we we looked at it we know it can be

00:19:17.120 competitive we know um it can be it will bring uh value and we know it's 10 to 12 times less

00:19:24.640 expensive than building a dam, as an example. And like I said, a lot quicker. If you know how it

00:19:31.440 costs to build a dam, then 10 times less, you will have an answer there. But we believe

00:19:39.680 it will become an asset for generations to come. We hope to have Indigenous participation in the

00:19:47.760 project as soon as possible uh and and it will be developed over time it will not develop the entire

00:19:55.680 dome uh right away this is the massive asset you've done chunks yeah so the first cavern hopefully

00:20:02.560 first one or two cavern in the next five years and then let's see where the market will go and

00:20:08.640 who knows sounds great well uh good luck and i guess we're we're gonna see you down at the oil

00:20:13.920 show uh we're gonna be at the oil show this year and uh definitely i will be there congratulations

00:20:20.240 and hope everything goes well yeah thank you thank you very much yep hi uh we're back here

00:20:27.280 with the business standard the western standards weekly business show and uh we've got a couple

00:20:32.160 guests with us uh authors of a new book called it starts with gold it's uh the history of gold

00:20:38.640 and the world's most precious metal and you know the cultural and financial significance of it all

00:20:43.840 that would be peter merrick and adrian spitters our co-authors adrian is a son of a dutch farmer

00:20:50.720 and peter is a cross-border financial strategist designated expert best-selling author and keynote

00:20:56.720 speaker with over 30 years experience in business succession estate planning and financial sovereignty

00:21:02.000 his insights have appeared in the wall street journal bloomberg and dow jones

00:21:06.080 adrian is a private wealth advisor with 37 years experience helping high net worth individuals

00:21:11.120 protect and grow wealth specializing in de-risked tax efficient portfolios with alternative

00:21:16.480 investments like equity real estate commodities and mutual life insurance strategies and today

00:21:21.440 they're here to talk to us about everybody's favorite precious metal gold uh what can you

00:21:28.080 fellas uh tell us a little bit maybe about your book and about gold and where you see it going

00:21:33.680 and why it's so important now more than ever giving some of the economic developments that we've had

00:21:40.000 with US President Donald Trump tariffs trade and the ultimate medium of exchange

00:21:47.880 well I want to share with you that the book is more encompassing than just gold

00:21:53.440 we called it it starts with gold it doesn't end with gold there's a lot of

00:21:57.280 changes that have happened that Canadians and people around the world

00:22:01.000 have noticed and we know this with the tariffs and everything in this skyrocketing

00:22:05.860 of prices inflation and everything and what adrian and i did is we looked at gold as being a

00:22:12.180 foundation it starts with gold it doesn't end with gold it represents de-risking your finances

00:22:20.340 because it's stable it's tangible you can hold it and we recommend that rather than actually having

00:22:27.140 a piece of paper saying that you have a claim to it and it is also about re-materializing

00:22:34.040 rematerializing your life to things that are important,

00:22:36.460 such as community, useful skills, things that are useful.

00:22:42.000 And in essence, we start working up to that.

00:22:45.340 And Adrian and I have something that's called the four pillars.

00:22:49.880 And Adrian, would you like to step in and share with a little more?

00:22:55.360 Well, the four pillars is how we basically de-risk clients' portfolios.

00:23:01.000 And it starts with, if you read the book, we talk about the great financial confiscation, which is where there's a high risk of people losing their assets through confiscation, through collapsing of banks, financial institutions, et cetera.

00:23:20.900 So we're looking at, okay, if you want to stay ahead of the curve of assets collapsing, what assets do you want to own in order of asset confiscation?

00:23:31.000 And that would be we start with gold as your foundation. It is your portfolio insurance. And it's one asset class that totally protects your assets throughout the ages. And then we look at alternative investments such as income producing multi family rental properties, self storage, farmland, hard assets that generate income are a lot more secure.

00:23:59.540 And they're also, you are a shareholder in these, these assets, or if you buy them directly, you have a much more secure title than if you bought into just say mutual funds or individual stocks.

00:24:13.740 So then we work with a private portfolio management company that again has custodial relationship so that the client's assets are the client's assets, not the institution where the investments are held at.

00:24:27.740 Whereas, for example, if you have money at a brokerage firm, those assets tend to be commingled with the broker.

00:24:34.960 We want to put a wall between that and then the final asset would be owning various financial investments held by mutual life companies,

00:24:48.500 which are policy older owned versus stock owned.

00:24:52.140 And the whole idea is to put walls in front of your assets ahead of potential collapse in the system.

00:25:01.960 So what we're looking at is, you know, you can't just put it all in gold.

00:25:07.420 It's not efficient, even though gold is not really, really well.

00:25:10.460 There are times where it's flat.

00:25:12.660 You need income.

00:25:13.940 You need to have a, you know, a semblance of normality in your portfolio, but structure in such a way that you can, as you see things unfolding,

00:25:21.900 you can move assets to more secure assets along the way so that's why we you know that's a that's

00:25:27.380 a really good point because uh adrian and i were talking prior to the show um doing a little back

00:25:32.300 and forth and we have a common dutch heritage where our grandparents went through the war

00:25:37.440 and uh we're talking about how um you know the nazis basically went and took everything that

00:25:43.080 they you know they could find and you know adrian's uh grandparents were farmers my grandfather was a

00:25:48.500 farmer and and you told the story about how they were taking the cows and and shooting the cows and

00:25:54.400 so this is almost a cautionary tale because it's actually happened within our lifetimes

00:25:59.760 correct can i share something just just add to that one thing that we thought was very important

00:26:08.860 if we want to know where we are we have to know where we've been so what adrian and i did in the

00:26:13.320 book is we looked at things such as the foundation of the federal reserve the bank of canada what are

00:26:20.440 these institutions are they public are they private for example right now in canada we're

00:26:26.920 having a an election and you have mark carney and a big wake-up call for me was when he was

00:26:35.180 appointed to the bank of england because i'm thinking how is this possible he's not even

00:26:39.440 british because these are private banks and we looked at what has happened in the past what are

00:26:45.900 all the white papers because i don't want to scare people but if you read what is

00:26:50.920 you dreaded in the book and that's why we have the four pillars

00:26:59.620 so um how is gold say compared to bitcoin because you you hear the bitcoiners talk and

00:27:08.380 I did a couple seminars last year and there's one coming up and, you know, that it's protected from the government and it's, you know, a libertarian kind of asset.

00:27:18.760 Like, how would you, how would you compare it to gold?

00:27:23.460 Bifcoing is a intangible electronic.

00:27:28.420 It's subject to, you need the internet to transact.

00:27:32.520 And there are many fears out in our community that we are susceptible to cyber attacks.

00:27:43.400 And so you have an intangible asset, just like fiat money, whereas gold is physical, it's hard, it's real.

00:27:51.660 You can take possession of yourself or vault it in a secure vault, either in Canada or outside of Canada.

00:27:58.540 so you have an asset that is protected that can't be taken down uh for example should the internet

00:28:04.780 come down and now and we devote two chapters in our in our book on crypto and um we've identified

00:28:12.620 threats that suggest that maybe um bitcoin for example is a trojan horse um training grounds

00:28:19.100 that teach people that uh getting familiar with the digital asset is is okay it starts out being

00:28:27.100 an asset that is supposed to be totally outside the system where now that they are um inside of

00:28:33.020 um etfs like blackrock's got i think one of the largest bitcoin etf out there at first um

00:28:42.060 blackrock was against etfs i'm sorry blackrock was against bitcoin now they're for it why because

00:28:47.580 they own an etf for it larry fink was just saying that just recently that uh bitcoin is the thing

00:28:53.820 but there's an ulterior motive i think it's uh an asset that is going to um basically entrap

00:29:01.660 people and at some point they're going to collapse bitcoin and then the government's going to come in

00:29:06.460 this is my theory and say well we got a safer version and that's the cbdc

00:29:12.940 can i add yeah sure oh that's central bank digital currency oh i see when we were do

00:29:21.100 when we were doing our research on bitcoin and crypto first of all no one knows who the creator

00:29:27.820 of that is and one of the things that most people have to consider is outside of things

00:29:34.380 that are tangible if you're speaking digitally you're they're able to track you like they're

00:29:39.660 like we all you know have been near someone's phone and then we get on our computer and then

00:29:43.980 we see the ads of something we were just talking about show up so there's these quantum computers

00:29:49.820 can slice through this coding but not only that we're using the internet that was created by the

00:29:55.040 NSA and Snowden talked about it in 2013 when he was a whistleblower we also all crypto is based

00:30:05.800 on the NSA's SHA-256 and that's an encryption and that's what everything is built on now I don't

00:30:15.600 know if you guys have been following your your viewers but these quantum chips are scary there

00:30:21.000 was a quantum chip called willow that did a calculation in five minutes that would have

00:30:27.600 taken the second fastest at that time a quantum computer 15 septillion years i i don't even know

00:30:37.300 what a trillion is basically but a subtillion is a trillion trillion so in essence this is

00:30:46.000 something that we have to be aware of because that's why in our book we look at everything

00:30:51.560 that's happening we dedicated two chapters asking questions who are these people what is this how

00:30:59.780 can it be attacked and our premise is you got to go back to the land and you were mentioning that

00:31:06.760 both of you have Dutch heritage both of you have farming in your blood and in essence it's getting

00:31:13.400 back to real things because one of the issues that's happened and I'm guilty of it we've all

00:31:21.240 gone digital we've all gone into cyberspace and unfortunately it doesn't work if things break

00:31:29.280 down if there happens to be a cyber attack if the power goes down I remember I'm from the east coast

00:31:35.740 of canada from toronto and in 2003 all the power went off on on the east coast there were like 70

00:31:43.900 million people who were in the dark it was beautiful i didn't know there were stars over

00:31:48.220 toronto yeah we don't have the problem with the ice storms here in in alberta where it's a little

00:31:55.100 bit different it's just sporty below and wind but yeah yeah that i you know that's ringing loud and

00:32:02.780 clear for me. So one of the themes in your book is sovereignty, like personal liberty and personal

00:32:09.220 sovereignty and taking control over your own finances and your own life. And you've got

00:32:14.180 something here called the Sovereign's Creed. Maybe you can speak a few words to that and

00:32:18.600 explain how it's important for our viewers. Adrian, can you say the Sovereign's Creed?

00:32:25.960 and I'd like to explain it.

00:32:29.260 The sovereign's creed

00:32:30.920 to protecting our health,

00:32:34.920 to protecting or to de-risking our wealth,

00:32:38.300 it starts with gold.

00:32:40.540 Very simple.

00:32:41.600 And I like to share what that means.

00:32:44.440 So the sovereign's creed,

00:32:45.620 it's a battle cry.

00:32:48.320 It's to tell,

00:32:49.900 it's to get people up

00:32:51.720 and what we do is to sovereignty.

00:32:53.600 What is sovereignty?

00:32:54.520 That means you have domain.

00:32:55.960 over yourself and in essence as a free person living in a free country we have certain

00:33:04.080 freedoms and in essence i don't believe a king or a government grants those freedoms they're innate

00:33:10.880 so that's so we we say to sovereignty to protecting our health because we all know

00:33:18.880 that the most important thing that we have is our health i know as i get older you guys are

00:33:24.220 younger than me, you know, when they say like, you know, health is wealth, you realize that as

00:33:29.440 you get older, you know, it's like when you're young, you, you don't take care of it. And no

00:33:34.660 one has a right. No one has a right to tell you what to do with your health. You're a sovereign

00:33:42.360 individual to de-risking your wealth. And that's where we talk about how do you make sure that if

00:33:48.900 everything goes crazy and everything starts collapsing how do you still have assets that

00:33:58.960 you can trade to live and protect your family and to grow your community and the last sentence is it

00:34:06.600 starts with gold meaning it's a foundational asset it's something that has lasted for millennium

00:34:15.920 and that is something that we're stressing and it's not just gold it's other precious metals

00:34:21.400 it's land it's seeds it's community it's useful skill that's what gold represents for us and yes

00:34:31.940 it's the tangible but it's also the intangible which cannot have a price placed on it so where

00:34:40.420 do we go from here where do you think where do you think it is all at anything like what happens

00:34:44.260 Because I'm assuming that you're, I don't know if anybody can predict it, but is it an inflection point?

00:34:51.100 Is it a sudden break or is it kind of a gradual thing that we all kind of ease into?

00:34:55.360 What does the next era of financial security look like?

00:35:01.120 Well, right now it's gradual.

00:35:03.740 They're putting in more and more and more controls to take away your assets.

00:35:09.080 Right now, for the most part, you have beneficial ownership of your stocks and bonds.

00:35:14.020 you don't have actual direct ownership that was done as you know convenience where instead what

00:35:22.660 happens is if you have your assets in a bank account you're lending your money to a bank

00:35:28.500 so and that's why you have cdic insurance because if the bank gets in trouble those assets belong

00:35:34.340 to the bank and that's their collateral so you get whatever's in in the cdic pool and that's

00:35:41.780 not going to be enough for if one of our major banks go under and there's another legislation

00:35:46.900 i can't remember they brought it in there but it was rather recently after 2008 uh peter knows the

00:35:52.100 date um is something called the bail-ins where now the banks they did a test in in in cyprus and in

00:36:00.100 greece and the bail-ins um is set up where if there is a bank run and the banks get in trouble

00:36:07.620 The banks have the ability now to dip into your bank accounts and use that as collateral.

00:36:14.380 And in exchange, they're going to give you securities of the bank.

00:36:18.300 Well, what's the benefit or good of having bank stocks when the banks are going down?

00:36:23.060 So you don't really want them to actually confiscate your assets and give you shares.

00:36:29.960 And then if you have a stock portfolio and a bond portfolio with a traditional stock broker,

00:36:35.060 those assets are also commingled with the institution because they use your assets for

00:36:40.680 futures trading, for all kinds of derivative trading. And again, they are higher up in the

00:36:48.080 chain of creditors on your assets. So again, you're not going to get your money back. You might get

00:36:54.760 a promise, a piece of paper or something that's going to say, you get share exchange. I don't

00:36:59.840 know what that remedy is. But in most cases in history, those people are going to lose those

00:37:06.020 assets, which is what's happened with SBB Bank in the States and the other banks that collapsed

00:37:10.880 recently. Those people lost their assets that were unsecured. So getting around my thought.

00:37:21.840 Can I add to that? I'm a student of history. So if we want to know where we're

00:37:29.820 going we have to go to the past so we have to look at our system is built on a fake fiat system

00:37:39.020 since 1971 in the united states they removed off the gold standard so it's just basically paper

00:37:45.220 printing paper it has no value it's just belief if we look at germany uh during the 20s we saw

00:37:53.700 inflation that we no one ever saw before knew it existed and that's why we ended up with hitler

00:37:59.160 because he was probably the most advanced country in the world,

00:38:04.740 the greatest intellects that just fell into chaos.

00:38:07.380 We also looked in our book at the Yuan Dynasty.

00:38:10.820 They were the first empire to implement paper.

00:38:16.100 What ended up happening is China collapsed under its own weight

00:38:21.100 because the paper is worth nothing.

00:38:23.340 And we all know about warlords in China because that's how it happened.

00:38:28.520 So what we do is we look at history and we look at what's been put in place as well.

00:38:34.800 And the part that's very scary is the people at the top in the financial system and all these great non-government organizations and all these unelected organizations like the UN, the IMF, the Bank of International Settlements.

00:38:51.920 they've actually put in certain measures that when the system collapses they'll own everything

00:38:59.360 and as adrian was sharing that most people have gone to sleep and what i mean by that in 2016

00:39:06.960 when the budget in canada was released everyone was talking about the things that were happening

00:39:14.420 that year but back in the back pages that's the really good stuff that's the stuff that they sneak

00:39:20.400 in that Canadians don't know about. And they talked about a bail-in. And what that means is

00:39:26.560 if a financial institution collapses, the financial institution can take all your assets.

00:39:35.240 Now, is there a case for this where it's happened before? Yes, in Cyprus. Anybody who had more than

00:39:41.420 $100,000 in a Cyprus bank had their money taken. The other example that we should be very concerned

00:39:48.860 is is what triggered the 2008 like well the finance the great financial recession that we

00:39:55.680 all remember is Lehman Brothers went bankrupt and its trustee and its main creditor was Morgan Stanley

00:40:05.020 they were a preferred creditor that means all the people who had their money with Lehman they

00:40:11.700 basically didn't get their money because jp morgan was a preferred creditor as the judge said and he

00:40:19.300 pulled everything and what's happened around the world is legislation has been passed that when

00:40:26.020 things aren't great people are going to go and find out that they own nothing because when we

00:40:31.140 were investigating the book we looked at something in the united states which you have we have in

00:40:36.260 canada as well they have the uh depository trust corporation where they dematerialized everything

00:40:42.100 your car your house your stock everything you don't own anything and around the world they

00:40:47.460 push this too where you have beneficial ownership so what we make the case in the book is we don't

00:40:53.540 make these claims we show you exactly what happened because it's important that if you're going to be

00:40:58.820 a sovereign you have to first know because by knowing you're able to exercise the most powerful

00:41:06.260 word that's ever been used in any language and that's saying no i will not participate in this

00:41:12.100 and we talk about the tools and adrian spoke about the four pillars because those are tools

00:41:18.740 that we identified where you're still in the system because most important you need community

00:41:24.580 you need useful skills and you need assets such as seeds land things that are

00:41:32.820 going if things really went crazy imagine if the power went out for two weeks right

00:41:42.900 like it did in ontario like you were saying during the ice storm and down east oh i i was

00:41:48.820 I was the last street, the last street to get power back.

00:41:53.740 Well, you know, guys, this has been really eye-opening and there are real world examples, like you said, of this happening.

00:41:59.620 Like I'm thinking Lebanon, it happened, maybe not a complete run on the bank, but, you know, we've seen examples in the news.

00:42:07.040 I've written about them.

00:42:08.160 Like you said, the financial crisis in various countries where the political situation becomes really sketchy.

00:42:16.320 Trade follows wars.

00:42:17.620 we we had this discussion here the other day you know which comes first right the trade or the

00:42:22.340 military and it seems to all follow hand in hand and then you're talking about community and society

00:42:30.100 and and being able to have these skills and to be able to weather these storms so um no a really

00:42:35.380 interesting talk um unfortunately we had to cut it a bit short but uh there you go again folks it's

00:42:41.060 all starts with gold by uh peter merrick and adrian spitters and i would say it's essential

00:42:47.220 reading and uh thanks for coming on guys and i really appreciate it thanks for being part of our

00:42:52.260 first ever business standard our pleasure thank you thank you

00:43:02.340 okay so that's it for today we're going to wrap it up with a quick reminder to become

00:43:09.300 members westerncenter.news subscribe all our coverage is free during the election campaign

00:43:14.660 and as uh peter and uh adrian were talking we've got one of these uh wef uh guys unelected people

00:43:23.140 trying to run for elected office so it's important now more than ever to be informed and to stay

00:43:28.500 abreast of some of these issues and how they affect you and affect your community and affect

00:43:32.340 your personal sovereignty so with that we make an appeal to become western standard

00:43:40.340 readers subscribe become members it's a small investment and it will pay dividends over time

00:43:46.340 and uh thank you very much and we'll sign it off here

Western Standard - April 09, 2025

It starts with Gold

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