Michael Saylor pushes for digital rights for digital assets and intelligence economy

Michael Saylor has stated that he wants individuals and companies to be given five guaranteed rights over digital assets. 

Saylor’s argument aims to provide cheaper capital and freer money, which he claims a productive, AI-driven economy will stall without. 

What rights does Michael Saylor want over digital assets? 

In an essay posted to X on Saturday, following an on-stage conversation at the Bitcoin Policy Institute’s Freedom Tech DC summit, Michael Saylor has proposed that individuals and corporations be given five fundamental rights. 

They include the right to create digital assets, issue them to raise money, custody them directly or through a chosen provider, transfer them freely, and use them to spend, invest, earn, and borrow. He wrote that those rights should be applied equally and be backed by financial privacy and real access to markets.

Saylor’s opinion is that ownership means little if the state limits what an owner can do. He pointed out that the recent legislation, the CLARITY bill, has roughly 630 pages, of which he estimated about 600 were restrictions. 

Cryptopolitan reported back in August that Saylor has spent the year sorting digital assets into tiers; digital capital, digital credit, digital money, and digital currency. 

Saylor said that AI and automation will destroy jobs and make existing products out of date. Prosperity, he says, depends on launching new businesses at a faster pace than the old ones disappear.

He argued that the U.S. should aim to let 10 million new companies raise capital, using the initial coin offering era as proof.

He stated that only about 400 well-known companies out of America’s 40 million businesses can easily raise money on public markets today and pointed out that even well-funded firms like BSTR and Twenty One struggle. 

Twenty One went public through a special-purpose acquisition company about 18 months ago and reportedly still cannot easily raise more money despite billions in capital and teams of lawyers.

Will banks be allowed to custody Bitcoin? 

Saylor, whose firm holds one of the largest corporate Bitcoin treasuries in the world, argued that banks should be allowed to custody Bitcoin and lend against it under workable rules. Insurers should also have a practical path to put digital capital on their balance sheets.

He stated that the Basel framework, the rule that requires banks to hold capital equal to 1,250% of the value of certain crypto holdings, is harsh and treats digital assets as extremely high-risk. He argued that a bank holding a customer’s crypto in custody, lending money using crypto as collateral, or betting on crypto with its own money are all different activities and the rules should reflect that.

Saylor thinks banks getting involved will be the biggest driver of growth for crypto going forward. He mentioned that roughly $1.6 trillion worth of Bitcoin currently exists, and most of it isn’t tied to any bank. 

Saylor said the US should let banks, fintech companies, and tech platforms freely compete to issue their own stablecoins and pay interest on them. He believes the competition would help spread the use of the U.S. dollar to billions of people worldwide who already have smartphones.

He also stated that reporting requirements, for instance, one that requires legal transactions under $10,000 to automatically get reported to the government, should have a clear purpose and be proportional to actual risk.

The smartest crypto minds already read our newsletter. Want in? Join them.