China just bought more gold than it has in three years, and the purchase raises one uncomfortable question: how safe are your money and savings? Tom Bilyeu wanted his millions of followers to get answers, so he built an entire episode around Felix Prehn’s explanation of China’s gold buying.
Tom Bilyeu, Entrepreneur, Latest: How to Protect Savings (Featured Felix Prehn on 4.6M YouTube Channel)
Economist and former investment banker Felix Prehn, founder of the Goat Academy, was featured on Tom Bilyeu’s YouTube channel with 4.6 million subscribers.
Tom Bilyeu pulled out of Felix Prehn’s episode “THEY are preparing for $30,000 Gold – Here’s Why That Should Scare You” four uncomfortable truths about Americans’ money. Each carries a practical warning for anyone holding savings, bonds, or stocks.
Key Takeaways
- Every dollar in a savings account, a bond, or a paycheck buys less over time, imported goods cost more, and nobody votes on the decision, yet everyone pays for it.
- The institutions with the best information are betting against the dollar, and a family holding only dollar assets is on the opposite side of that bet without knowing it.
- A household buying gold as protection can still lose control of it by law, so storage decides whether the protection is real.
- Anyone who bought gold through an app or a fund may hold a claim instead of metal, and finds out only when trust breaks.
Why Your Savings Buy Less Every Year
The American government wants three things at the same time: rebuilt factories, prices that stay low for ordinary families, and a strong dollar. Felix Prehn’s point is that only two of the three are possible, so one has to give. It will be the dollar, because the dollar does not vote.
A weaker dollar’s value is coming, and nobody can say how fast, which is why Felix Prehn argues for wider diversification and harder thinking about downside protection.
He warns that big investors, governments and central banks have already triggered protective strategies.
Central Banks Are Dumping The Dollar For Gold
China recently made its largest gold purchase in three years. At the same time, central banks around the world are reducing their American government debt, while increasing physical metal instead.
Specifically, China’s purchases started to rise sharply around 2022 and 2023. And recently, they sold hundreds of billions of dollars in American debt within 36 hours.
According to Felix Prehn, their actions mean two things:
- China is moving away from the dollar system on purpose
- The bullion being bought now is a bet that the dollar’s value will have reduced visibly in ten years.
If the dollar weakens as predicted, Americans will feel the loss directly in their savings, bonds, and stock portfolios.
Felix Prehn says having physical gold might protect investor funds as the dollar loses value. However, he admits the protection could be taken away.
In 1933, American citizens were forced by law to sell gold to the government at a fixed price.
A Government Can Legally Seize Your Gold
In 1933, the US government made it illegal to have gold. Everyone who owned some had to sell at $20.67 an ounce. The government bought all, and immediately increased the price.
The order proves gold ownership depends on the law, not on the metal itself. And a government can pass a similar order again if it needs to.
So what should everyday investors do? Felix Prehn’s advice is to spread your money between different asset types and think harder about protecting against losses.
Diversifying into gold only works if you have the real metal, not a promise on paper.
Gold Bought In An App Isn’t Real
Here’s how paper gold works: a bank sells you a contract, or a number on an app, which represents your claim to the precious metal. Many banks sell claims on limited bullion to several buyers. If everyone asks to get physical gold at the same time, the bank wouldn’t be able to satisfy the demand.
If you have gold through an app or a fund, ask yourself: Can I get the physical metal delivered to me right now, if I ask for it? If the answer is no, what you hold is only a promise, not gold.
And if you’re trying to protect your savings with gold, you gain nothing if what you have is only a claim, rather than the metal. The protection Felix Prehn describes exists only for people who can turn their claim into physical metal in hand when they need it.
What Tom Bilyeu and Felix Prehn Give Everyday Investors
Tom Bilyeu and Felix Prehn share a rare commitment: they turn complicated money topics into plain lessons ordinary people can use.
Tom Bilyeu has spent years questioning specialists and breaking hard subjects into valuable information for millions of viewers, while Felix Prehn shares how stock markets, investment risk, and stock portfolios work on his YouTube channel Felix & Friends, several podcasts, and websites daily.
Together, Tom Bilyeu and Felix Prehn help audiences read the moves of central banks and big investors, then think through the risks calmly instead of reacting in fear.
Their shared approach gives regular readers the same context Wall Street insiders rely on, without pressure to buy or sell anything.
Tom Bilyeu and Felix Prehn will share even more in a new podcast episode scheduled for the end of August 2026.
