100 billion reasons Apple should get behind Bitcoin: Michael Saylor

Apple should invest a portion of its massive cash reserves in Bitcoin, Toroso Investments’ portfolio manager Dan Weiskopf posted earlier today on the ETF Think Tank website.

The site’s lead ETF strategist’s call follows in the footsteps of MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor and former Goldman Sachs hedge fund manager Raoul Pal, who both predicted Apple would make a large scale investment in Bitcoin in the upcoming years.

Saylor retweeted and endorsed Weiskopf’s piece with the comment that the tech giant could see a $100 billion gain in market cap by integrating Bitcoin with their products and adding it to their holdings.

#Apple could generate $100 billion or more in shareholder value if they integrated #Bitcoin into Apple Pay, built a secure crypto wallet into the iPhone, and began buying #BTC with their Treasury Reserves. h/t @ETFProfessor https://t.co/zqDNuFskeY

— Michael Saylor (@michael_saylor) November 11, 2020

With a market cap north of $2 trillion, Apple (AAPL) is the world’s most valuable company and has nearly $192 billion cash on hand, according to an earnings report released on Oct. 29.

Weiskopf laid out the case that an investment in Bitcoin of between $10 billion to $20 billion would be more profitable in the long term than Apple’s plan of carrying on with “risky and expensive” stock buybacks. He said it would also be a prudent hedge against inflation.

“I get that certain institutional shareholders might get twisted up by the purchase of Bitcoin, but we need to work through the math and the opportunity versus the stock buyback,” he wrote.

“Whether you see Bitcoin as a hedge against inflation, a speculation or an alternative asset class, it is a technological innovation that Apple is in a unique position to access and provide to its shareholders.”

Being substantially larger in both reach and market cap than Bitcoin, Weiskopf argues that Apple can help Bitcoin reach true levels of mainstream adoption, to the benefit of both.

“Apple’s management has a unique opportunity to think outside the box. The company’s loyal ecosystem, technological expertise and financial strength means that a relatively small risk towards digital could align it with the most disruptive technology trend since the internet.”

As an aside, the price of BTC would need to rise 545% — roughly $100,000 per BTC — in order to approach Apple’s current market cap of $2.03 trillion.