How a Blockchain Expert Used Gold Signals to Invest in Bitcoin

Happy Tuesday, GoldBuzzers!

Today we're handing the mic to Nigel Hughes, a blockchain engineer who's been in crypto since you had to mine Bitcoin just to own it. Nigel helped build the technical backbone behind the original Theseus silver research project - and when the system he helped create told him to ignore every crypto bull on the internet last August, he listened.

What happened next is a story worth reading. Plus, the founding member waitlist for GoldBuzz Insider closes Thursday night.

Ok. Let’s get into it. ⬇️

Gold climbed its way up to $5,227 on Monday to trade near multi-week highs, while silver stole the show with a 4%+ surge to over $88 - its best single-day performance in weeks.

The catalyst? A one-two punch that safe-haven traders absolutely love. First, the Supreme Court's landmark 6-3 ruling on Friday potentially striking down President Trump's IEEPA tariffs lasted about five minutes before the White House fired back with a brand new 15% global tariff under Section 122 - a dusty 1974 trade law that's never been used before.

That triggered immediate blowback: the EU hit pause on ratifying its US trade deal, India shelved interim negotiations, and futures traders dumped equities faster than you can say "trade war." Layer on the US-Iran nuclear standoff (diplomats meet again in Geneva Thursday, but nobody's holding their breath), Chinese buyers flooding back in after the Lunar New Year break, and a weakening dollar, and you've got the perfect recipe for a metals rally.

The gold/silver ratio compressed to around 59.5, showing silver flexing its dual safe-haven and industrial muscle - the Silver Institute is projecting a sixth straight year of supply deficits in 2026, driven by insatiable AI and clean energy demand. Goldman Sachs is sticking with its $5,400 year-end gold target, but days like today make that look very conservative.

by Nigel Hughes

Nigel Hughes is a blockchain engineer and technical consultant with over 30 years of experience in fintech, trading systems, and emerging technology. He's held senior roles including work with the NEM Foundation, one of the world's leading blockchain organizations, and has led technical strategy for trading and blockchain platforms across Asia, Europe, and the Middle East.

Last August, a systematic investment model I'd been beta testing flagged Bitcoin as bearish at around $114,000. At the time, pretty much every major crypto adviser out there was calling for an epic run to $200,000.

I'll be honest - when the price spiked to $125,000 in early October, I was convinced the crypto bulls were going to be proved right.

But the model stayed bearish. So I resisted the urge to buy more.

Then the price broke. It fell through September, bounced briefly, and then kept falling - down to about $90,000 by year-end and around $65,000 today. So far, that’s a 43% decline over 6 months from where those bearish signals first triggered.

I've been investing in crypto since 2009-2010 when a friend started mining Bitcoin. Back then you couldn't even buy it - you had to mine it, which is what I started doing. Over the years I've built up holdings in Bitcoin, Ethereum and BNB, and a lot of my consulting clients have paid me in crypto, which has suited me fine.

So I'm not new to this. I've been through the cycles. And I've paid for plenty of crypto trading services over the years - the most recent was about $130 a month. What I disliked about most of them was that they were permanent crypto bulls. Their signals were very short-term and practically impossible to follow unless you were glued to a screen all day.

The system I've been testing is different. And to explain how I ended up testing it, I need to go back a few years.

I first worked with Rick Adams about 15 years ago on a data analysis project in the UK. In early 2020, he got in touch again - he'd just started working with a professional statistician on a new research project analysing global silver markets. He asked me to help design and build the technical infrastructure behind it.

Over the next few years, we collected and validated data going back over half a century, built out the server architecture, and Rick ran his analysis. The project was called Theseus, and it took four years to complete.

When we spoke in early 2024, Rick told me Theseus was indicating a major breakout in gold and silver - the beginning of a bull market beyond anything we'd experienced before. That was quite a claim, considering our data included the roaring bull market of the late 1970s.

He also told me he was going to expand the methodology beyond silver into gold and the mining companies. I told him he should include Bitcoin too, since that's been my primary focus. I was glad to see it make the cut.

In early 2025, Rick asked if I'd join a small group testing his live system, which had evolved from Theseus into what's now being released as GoldBuzz Insider. I said yes.

The system covers five markets - Gold, Silver, Bitcoin, Gold Miners and Silver Miners - with two strategy variants for each: Max Return and Min Risk. Within gold and silver miners, there's coverage of over 200 companies across majors, producers, juniors, ETFs and royalty companies. I'll talk about the mining signals in Part 2.

For now, here's what happened with Bitcoin.

Both the Max Return and Min Risk systems gave me 5 trades over the course of 2025. The raw numbers look modest - the Max Return system made a small profit and the Min Risk system returned about 8%. But the numbers don't tell the real story.

What impressed me was the conviction. The winning trades ran long and captured the bulk of each move. The losing trades were cut short. And the two longest-duration trades made the most money in both systems.

The Min Risk system turned bullish on May 12th and stayed bullish until August 19th, closing that single trade with a 9.8% profit.

Then came August 24th. Both systems turned bearish at the same time, with Bitcoin around $114,000. That's the call I mentioned at the top - the one that went against virtually every crypto analyst I follow.

I won't pretend I found it easy to sit on my hands while Bitcoin spiked to $125,000 in October. But the systems were clear, so I stayed out. And then the floor dropped.

My long-term crypto holdings have obviously lost value along with everything else. But if I'd followed mainstream crypto sentiment and bought more back in August, I'd be sitting on much bigger losses today. The system kept me out of that.

For me, that's the real takeaway. It's not about the 8% gain. It's about the 43% loss I avoided. After years of paying for crypto services that were basically cheerleaders with charts, having a systematic approach that actually tells you when to step aside - that's been worth more than any of them.

In Part 2, I'll share my experience with the Gold, Silver and Mining signals, including how I've been using the mining company data to make investment decisions.

Nigel is an expert in all things Crypto, Blockchain and AI. He consults remotely with individuals and small teams from all over the world. Feel free to get in touch with him via his LinkedIn.

That’s all for this Tuesday, folks. See you on Thursday with Part 2 of Nigel’s piece.

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Rick Adams
Founder, GoldBuzz
rick@goldbuzz.com