“I was at the PBOC. I was at CIC, the big sovereign wealth fund, all asking about gold. What's going on with gold? Gold in this day and age. Because they don't have a reserve currency. For us, it's a luxury. Like, who cares, right? It's a side show. It's like Bitcoin. You play or you don't. But for them, it's existential.”
The Compound and Friends · October 2026
Timmer describing a trip to Asia in which he met central banks and sovereign wealth funds on behalf of Fidelity's international business. What struck him was how much they wanted to talk about gold, and how differently the question looks from a country whose currency is not the one the world holds in reserve.
Transcript
I met with all the central banks. They have
mandates with the governments of these places. So Fidelity
International is institutional and wholesale. So it's not like the U.S. where you buy a mutual fund. And being the Fidelity brand, we have access. I mean, I was at the PBOC. I was at CIC, the big sovereign wealth fund, all asking about gold. What's going on with gold? Gold in this day and age. Because they don't have a reserve currency. For us, it's a luxury. Like, who cares, right? It's a size show. It's like Bitcoin. You play or you don't. But for them, it's existential.
That Fidelity event I did with Peter Lynch was definitely like a career highlight. Nice. Like guys like you and I, we're always talking. We're always, he doesn't do a lot of that. And he was razor sharp. And I think, so I think at first we did a prep call. And as you can imagine, it's Fidelity. So…
So can I tell you, my dad? He took the room over. So Peter Lynch was the only person other than me who ever did TV for Fidelity. He was on Louis River. Is that true? He was on, well, for the 99%. He was on Louis Rukaiser, Wall Street Week. And then he retired, but nobody, nobody who's a big…
Amazing.
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