I believe Samson arrives at this 83,000 BTC total by looking at the reported gold reserves of the Republic of China (colloquially known as Taiwan) in proportion to the gold supply held by central banks around the world, building off of RFK Jr's strategy. Very cool.

For reference, the gold supply for the Central Bank of China (🇹🇼 ) was mostly brought over by the Chinese Nationalists at the end of the Chinese Civil War. The gold is currently held in the mountains of Wulai, Xindian District under military guard. Our "Fort Knox" is called 文園. Central Bank of China has the world's 12th largest gold reserve

83,000 BTC sounds fine for the Republic of China. I personally think that Taiwan should set their sights higher. It's important to remember that Taiwan is the name of the island; it is currently a territory of the Republic of China. Strictly speaking, there is no "Taiwan" to hold Bitcoin, just individual Taiwanese.

While they are often discussed together, Taiwanese independence and global recognition of Republic of China (which left the UN in 1971) aren't the same thing. Both worthwhile pursuits.

Taiwan has had a rough century with fiat money. The story of the current iteration of the New Taiwan Dollar issued by the Central Bank of China in Taipei is actually fairly new (2000).

Taiwan didn't have an island-wide circulating currency until 1899 when the Bank of Taiwan issued gold-backed yen notes when it became a Japanese colony near the end of the Qing dynasty.

Prior to an island-wide currency, the pirate island of Taiwan used Spanish and Dutch copper and silver coins (15-16th centuries), which eventually turned into silver taels from the Ming and Qing dynasties. Taiwanese history shows that Taiwanese understand the prosperity (and chaos) that can occur when economic actors (pirates) have the freedom to choose their own money.

Taiwanese exported gold and lumber to fund the Japanese war efforts, but by the end of WWII, the Taiwanese gold vaults were effectively empty, unable to back the circulating currency. When the retreating Chinese Nationalists came over (in the midst of their own hyperinflation), the currency fell into disarray as it was no longer backed by the banks of the Japanese empire.

Taiwanese yen was converted to the "old Taiwan dollar" at a rate of 1:1. In two short years (1949) as the Central Bank of China in Shanghai fell into its own hyperinflation, the exchange rate became 40,000:1. At this point, the Central Bank of China had collapsed, and the only remaining bank operating in the territories of the Republic of China was the Bank of Taiwan. The Bank of Taiwan then issued the first iteration of the New Taiwan Dollar (1949) backed with whatever could be seized by force. The Bank of Taiwan had this peculiar structure where it issued currency for circulation sitting outside of the Republic of China constitution; this was rectified in the year 2000 when the Central Bank of China was reinstated in full, returning the power to "print".

In short, Taiwan never had its own money.

The gold doesn't belong to Taiwan and the notes are printed by a bank that isn't from the island. To change the status quo would be very difficult because the constitution of the Republic of China is notoriously hard to change. Taiwan would need another solution.

Bitcoin's 21 million offers a unique opportunity for Taiwan's 23 million people. Taiwan's greatest export of the last few decades has been affordable secure computing, which aligns well with Bitcoin. I believe Taiwan benefits from Bitcoin's success whether or not politicians do anything. A money without a state for an island without a country has a nice ring to it.

Taiwan has always been a bastion of free trade, often shared across empires even under colonial rule. Taiwan has never been a winner-takes-all. From a historical standpoint, the role as a geopolitical chess piece to check global powers is an anomaly.

I believe one day "Bitcoin" will be known in the future as Taiwan's greatest export (far more important than smartphone cpus and boba milk tea). Whether from the ASICs hashing away the next block, to the memory and storage chips for the saving transactions and block data, to the cpus to run the software that validates everything, and all the networking components to tie it all together even down to tiny screws and bolts to put them all together. There's a lot to be proud of for what Taiwan can offer Bitcoin.