| Keith Weiner | PhD, CEO & Founder, Chairman of the Board | Leadership Team | Keith Weiner is an economist who is a leading authority in the areas of gold, money, and credit and has made important contributions to monetary theory. He is also an entrepreneur who specializes in businesses that solve hard problems. Before Monetary Metals, he founded DiamondWare, a software company that developed 3D voice technology, sold to Nortel in 2008. He is the President of the Gold Standard Institute USA. He earned his PhD from the New Austrian School of Economics. |
| Jeff Deist | Chief Risk Officer | Leadership Team | Jeff spent ten years as president of the Mises Institute, where he wrote hundreds of articles and delivered countless speeches on topics of monetary policy, gold, and central banking. Prior to that he worked on Capitol Hill as Chief of Staff for Congressman Ron Paul. He previously worked as an attorney in law firms and public accounting firms specializing in private equity, mergers & acquisitions, and tax. Jeff holds degrees in law and taxation. |
| John Flaherty | Chief Operating Officer | Leadership Team | Throughout his career, John has excelled in operational leadership roles in the fields of commercial construction management, real estate development and education. In his recent role as Director of Real Estate Development for BASIS Independent Schools, John was responsible for developing a national portfolio of elite private schools. He has a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Arizona State University and pursued graduate studies in economics at the University of Arizona. |
| Nathan Lucas | Chief Financial Officer | Leadership Team | Nathan Lucas has over 25 years as an accounting professional. After graduating with a Bachelor of Commerce (Major Accounting & Economics) from Monash University, he was admitted to the Institute of Chartered Accountant in Australia whilst working in the audit division of Ernst & Young. Nathan has worked in a variety of senior finance roles including guiding a start-up to IPO, extensive experience in ERP system implementation as well as being CEO and founder of an Accounting Software business. |
| Miranda Werstiuk | Chief Revenue Officer | Leadership Team | Miranda has over 30 years’ experience in finance for the resources sector. She has worked across the spectrum of transaction mechanisms (equity, debt, and alternative financing), with a focus on complex structuring for creative and mutually beneficial solutions. She has relationships with private and public corporate issuers, as well as high net worth individual and institutional investors. Miranda regularly contributes to conferences including PDAC, 121 Mining, Mining Indaba, Mines & Money London, IMARC, and CIM. She is Chair of the Program Advisory Group for planetGOLD, which seeks to eliminate mercury used by artisanal and small gold miners, as well as being a long-standing participant and committee member of WIM Toronto. |
| Dickson Buchanan, Jr | Chief Commercial Officer | Leadership Team | Prior to joining Monetary Metals, Dickson served as Senior Broker and Director of International Development at SchiffGold, where he helped a wide range of investors to obtain a strategic allocation into gold and silver both domestically and abroad. He received a Master‘s in Economics from King Juan Carlos University in Madrid, Spain where he studied under renowned Spanish economists Jesús Huerta de Soto and Juan Ramón Rallo. |
| KC Sparks | Chief Technology Officer | Leadership Team | A graduate of The Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at ASU, KC is a value-driven technology expert with a proven record for developing and implementing robust software solutions that enhance profitability, efficiency, and redundancy. He has led initiatives resulting in SOC 2 compliance, optimized infrastructure and deployment workflows, and ensured optimal prioritization and execution of software strategies aligned with the intricate demands of the financial sector—all while fostering a culture of ownership, empowerment, and collaboration among his growing team. His evolution from Lead Software Engineer to Chief Technology Office reflects his commitment to excellence and deep understanding of software development. |
| Addison Quale | Vice President Relationship Management | Leadership Team | Addison concentrated in economics at Harvard University and came to embrace libertarian thought while studying for a Master of Divinity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Addison worked as a precious metals specialist at SchiffGold, with additional work experience at Cambridge Associates, a Boston based investment consulting firm. |
| Mark Pey | Director of Strategic Relationships | Dubai office | Leadership Team | Mark brings significant experience across financial services, technology, and digital physical gold management to Monetary Metals. His career background includes roles as Financial Services Industry Manager, Microsoft Corporation, where he ran Microsoft's financial services practice across Australia, New Zealand, and 'English speaking Asia' (Singapore and Hong Kong). He was also Vice President, J.P. Morgan American Century, where he ran institutional investment sales for some of their largest clients including Intel Corporation. Lockheed-Martin, and Bechtel Corporation. |
| Jeffrey Rhodes | Managing Director Business Development, Middle East and Asia | Leadership Team | A leading expert in the international precious metals market, Jeffrey is widely recognized as 'The Godfather of Gold Leasing.' For over 45 years, he served major financial institutions, including Credit Suisse, HSBC, Standard Bank, and StoneX. He founded Rhodes Precious Metals Consultancy DMCC in 2013, was appointed as Principal Consultant to Goldstrom Pte in 2022, and in 2025, he was named the CEO of Goldstrom Advisory DMCC. He's played a prominent role in the development of the Dubai Multi Commodity Centre, and he's been a member of Dubai’s Gold Advisory Group since its inception in 2003. He was a Chairman of the Public Affairs Committee of the LBMA, during which time he founded its popular trade magazine, The Alchemist. |
| Andrew Senior | Vice President Strategic Relationships | Leadership Team | Andrew is a creative entrepreneur with experience in investor engagement, commercial partnerships, and scalable growth strategies. With a career spanning decades and continents, he has founded and scaled several successful ventures, including Skuuudle, IT247.com, and Marsland Holdings—and raised over £65 million in capital across various funding rounds. He has led international expansion efforts across the US, China, and Russia, has advised C-level teams on fintech, pricing automation, & emerging tech, and drove strategic partnerships and investment initiatives at Glint Pay. |
| Hiren Chandaria | Managing Director, Middle East and Asia Operations | Leadership Team | Hiren Chandaria is a seasoned precious metals executive with over two decades of experience in gold investment, structured finance, and market development. He helped structure India’s first and largest gold savings fund, which won CNBC’s “Most Innovative Fund” award, while another fund he managed was ranked Bloomberg’s best-performing gold fund globally. A CFA Charterholder and Sloan Fellow of London Business School, Hiren leads Monetary Metals’ expansion across the Middle East and Asia. |
| Jim Brown | Director | Board of Directors | Jim lives in Jackson Hole and manages the Justice Brown Family Office. His finance career includes ten years as a stockbroker and 20 years as partner and portfolio manager at Brandes Investment Partners of San Diego. Prior to his finance career, he was an Air Force instructor pilot and an airline pilot. Jim is a Chartered Financial Analyst, holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BS in political science from the United States Air Force Academy. |
| Simon Guenzl | Director | Board of Directors | Simon Guenzl has over 30 years of experience in finance, including over 20 years in private-markets investing. His experience includes advising on mergers & acquisitions at several leading Wall Street investment banks, making venture-capital investments in start-ups, and investing in private-equity and venture-capital funds on both a primary and secondary basis. He holds a law degree from the University of Western Australia and an MBA from the Wharton School of Business. |
| Ronald P. Stöferle | Advisor | Board of Advisors | Ronnie is managing partner of Incrementum AG and responsible for Research and Portfolio Management. Upon graduation, he joined the Research department of Erste Group, where he published his first “In Gold We Trust” report in 2007. The report has become one of the benchmark publications on gold, money, and inflation. Since 2013, he has held the position as reader at scholarium in Vienna, and he also speaks at Wiener Börse Akademie. In 2014, he co-authored the book “Austrian School for Investors” and in 2019 “Die Nullzinsfalle” (The Zero Interest Rate Trap). He is a member of the board of Tudor Gold, a Canadian exploration company, and an advisor to Matterhorn Asset Management, a global leader in asset preservation in the form of physical gold stored outside the banking system. |
| Mark Valek | Advisor | Board of Advisors | Mark is fund manager and partner of Incrementum AG. His passion is to apply interdisciplinary thinking to investment. He is particularly fascinated with the Austrian School of Economics, monetary history, and the foreseeable paradigm shift in the monetary system. Prior to the establishment of Incrementum AG, he was with Raiffeisen Capital Management for ten years, most recently as fund manager in the area of inflation protection and alternative investments. He gained entrepreneurial experience as co-founder of Philoro Edelmetalle GmbH. Since 2013, he has held the position as reader at scholarium in Vienna, and he also speaks at Wiener Börse Akademie. In 2014, he co-authored the book “Austrian School for Investors”. |
| Brent Johnson | Advisor | Board of Advisors | A globally recognized macroeconomic professional with over 25 years of financial markets experience, Brent is the CEO of Santiago Capital. Previously he served as Managing Director at BakerAvenue, a $2.5 billion wealth management practice where he advised several of the firm’s largest clients. Prior to that, he worked almost a decade in the private client group at Credit Suisse. Brent is widely known for his “Dollar Milkshake Theory” and speaks frequently on macroeconomics, currencies, and precious metals. |
Keith, I love the work you do for us and reading your blog is like taking a graduate course in economics.
In this instance, there may not be quite as direct a link between investment and price destruction as would usually be found. As I understand Costco’s business model, they mark up the goods they sell enough to cover their operating costs and treat membership fees as their profit. I know that’s simplified and may not be entirely accurate but that’s what a Costco employee explained to me a long time ago. If Costco is increasing chicken capacity by 100,000,000 it might be more to keep prices from rising than to push them down, which is two sides of the same coin. Taking into account my rate of Costco chicken consumption, their additional capacity might only be 1 or 2 chickens per member per year. Chickens are a staple food item worldwide and Costco has a history of bringing production of steady demand items in-house and becoming more vertically integrated. If they can do that with cheap credit instead of equity with a steadily rising dividend, it probably works out for them.
This stumps me. Costco makes money on its membership fees, but a hyper thin margin on cost of goods sold, but it turns over its inventory more than almost any retailer. Returns on capital are high.
But vertically integrating into chicken processing? I don’t quite get it. A lot of upfront investment and the payback?
There are some unanswered questions from Keith’s report, like whether the new chicken processing capacity will be US-based or foreign. If foreign then being in control of the production chain makes much more sense and better quality control. The payback is when people bring their Costco roast chicken home to their small apartment and all their neighbors can smell it and go join Costco too. I’m just speculating here, I don’t really know.
What I do know is that the money I save buying my gas at Costco literally pays for my annual Executive membership which I think is up to $120 now. So all my other purchases are literally cost plus 5% (or whatever). Compare that with your grocery store markups.
They say it tastes like chicken.
I question the wisdom of investing in poultry farms. Concern is being raised about these kinds of chickens. Arsenic, antibiotics from roxarsone, caffeine and a host of toxic chemicals are beginning to make consumers a little leery about eating these chickens. Here is just one link Pub Med in case you think I’m just passing along hearsay. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22244353 Sure, most people aren’t going to dig up information for themselves, but word gets out eventually.
Investing a quarter billion dollars in this kind industry seems a little like pulling out the pin on a grenade. I wouldn’t be expecting a positive outcome in the long run. Not raising prices on a hot dog and a soda since 1980? Let’s say you pay $5.00 for this meal (I’m not a Costco member so I have to guess). That’s only $1.56 in 1980 dollars. If this is their business model, I am concerned for them. Hmm… I think I may look for an opportunity to short Costco.
If you wonder how I came up with these dollar values, here is a useful link: https://www.saving.org/inflation/inflation.php?amount=25,000&year=1978