Crucial to Asset Allocation in the 2020s: Financial Advisers Talk About Bitcoin’s Rising Relevance

In this special episode recorded live on Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2020, we join independent investment adviser Tyrone Ross as he speaks with Adam Pokornicky, COO of Digital Asset Investment Management; Andy Edstrom, financial adviser and investor at WESCAP Group; and Sunayna Tuteja, head of digital assets at TD Ameritrade.

"My frustration was, one, educating clients and, two, was also just looking at my colleagues and the blank stares, all the usual tropes and skeptical takes. If you wind back the clock to a few years ago, it was understandable that financial advisers weren't up [on] the curve. They hadn't done their homework yet. In the year 2020, you're running out of excuses," said Andy Edstrom, author of "Why Buy Bitcoin: Investing Today in the Money of Tomorrow."

He continued:

"Financial advisers think in asset classes. You've got your growth equities, you've got your value equities, you've got your emerging markets, you've got all these classes of fixed income. Where we are today there's a newly important asset class. That asset class is hard money assets. Government bonds now yield essentially zero, and they're printing so much money that regardless of who wins the election, they're going to print a lot more of it.

Holding those hard money assets that can perform in a period of large deficits and lots of money printing, I think is going to be crucial for client portfolios. Historically that was gold, but now with bitcoin, we have an asset that is even harder than gold and it has other favorable characteristics.

For financial advisers who are listening and wondering, 'What box do I put bitcoin in?' I'll tell you where I put it: It's in the digital gold box and for me, that's going to be a crucial asset allocation for the 2020s because of where we are today."

See also: Government Reimagined, With Jeff Saviano and Glen Weyl

In this hour-long session, they explore the institutional landscape and how financial advisers (FA) should think about it. They discuss the big questions for FAs and professional investors in a jargon-free, transparent discussion.

Toward the end of the session, they answer questions from registered financial advisors (RIA) in the live audience who are new to the space.