Originally published October 31 2015
Overstock chairman comes out as a prepper: $10 million in gold, months of food stored away for employees to survive coming crash
by J. D. Heyes
(NaturalNews) Middle America and rural dwellers aren't the only Americans who feel a need to be prepared for the as-yet-unseen disaster. Wealthy and powerful Americans are also getting ready for something catastrophic.
As reported by Zero Hedge, officials who head up the online retailer Overstock are not huge fans of the current fiat financial system in general or Wall Street in particular.
The site notes:
Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne's crusade against naked short sellers in particular, and Wall Street and the Federal Reserve in general, has long been known and thoroughly documented (most recently with his push to use blockchain technology to revolutionize the multi-trillion repo market).
Nevertheless, what was recently learned about Overstock's CEO, Jonathan Johnson, was even more eye-opening.
Johnson is a regular, vocal opponent of the fiat monetary system as well as Wall Street's uncanny ability to create endless bubbles that harm investors, especially ordinary Americans who are just trying to build up a nest egg for retirement.
His company also happens to favor gold as a backup to the fiat paper money system. In preparation for the next "market adjustment" (more commonly known as a "crash"), the company has taken unprecedented steps to protect itself and prepare for whatever comes next.
"One week ago Johnson, who is also candidate for Utah governor, spoke at the United Precious Metals Association, or UPMA, which we first profiled a month ago, and which takes advantage of Utah's special status allowing the it to use gold as legal tender, offering gold and silver-backed accounts," Zero Hedge reported. The UPMA takes paper dollars and translates them into gold and silver dollars; the gold dollars are premised on the $50 one-ounce gold coins that are produced by the U.S. Treasury. They are legal tender under the law and are protected as being legal tender.
"We have about $10 million in gold"
What, exactly, did Johnson say in his address to the association? Here are some quotes:
We are not big fans of Wall Street and we don't trust them. We foresaw the financial crisis, we fought against the financial crisis that happened in 2008; we don't trust the banks still and we foresee that with QE3, and QE4 and QE that at some point there is going to be another significant financial crisis.
So what do we do as a business so that we would be prepared when that happens? One thing that we do that is fairly unique: we have about $10 million in gold, mostly the small button-sized coins, that we keep outside of the banking system. We expect that when there is a financial crisis there will be a banking holiday. I don't know if it will be 2 days, or 2 weeks, or 2 months. We have $10 million in gold and silver in denominations small enough that we can use for payroll. We want to be able to keep our employees paid, safe and our site up and running during a financial crisis.
We also happen to have three months of food supply for every employee that we can live on.
Hideaways and retreats
Much of the rest of his speech contains language that will be familiar to anyone who advocates for sound money, specifically the idea that paper money has no real intrinsic value, that solid gold does have that value as a currency and asset (but is difficult to transport), and that gold-backed money is likely your best option. One other thing to note: during a systemic collapse, the federal government would likely confiscate any and all gold it could find, so portability is important.
The Overstock.com executives are part of a growing cadre of wealthy Americans who are building "safe rooms" in their luxury apartments or buying up land in remote places where they can retreat in the event of an economic collapse or other catastrophe.
Sources include:
ZeroHedge.com
Bugout.news
Collapse.news
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