(Miles Franklin Media) – Publicly traded companies may be the newest entrants in the global rush for precious metals, with some firms beginning to add physical silver to their balance sheets as a treasury asset, according to Scottsdale Mint CEO Josh Phair.

“I just had a publicly traded company and we’re doing account paperwork right now and they’re adding silver onto their treasury management. And it’s a large amount. I’ve never seen anything like this,” Phair said in an interview with Michelle Makori, President & Editor-in-Chief of Miles Franklin Media.

Phair said the development reflects a broader shift in the precious metals market, where demand is increasingly driven by governments, banks and institutional buyers rather than retail investors.

“We’re in a new paradigm,” he said on The Real Story with Michelle Makori. “This is no longer a trade. This is a whole new shift where banks want to own more on their balance sheets… central banks are buying, institutions are buying.”

The Scottsdale Mint chief said the trend is unfolding across multiple layers of the financial system, from sovereign buyers to private institutions and now corporate treasuries.

“Banks want to own more on their balance sheets, whether that’s a private bank… central banks are buying, institutions are buying,” Phair said.

Makori asked Phair to clarify whether he is seeing publicly listed companies directly adding physical silver to their balance sheets. “Yeah, there are companies doing it,” Phair said. “And this is someone that’s in the digital realm.”

For Phair’s silver outlook and his thoughts on triple digit silver, watch the video above. 

Corporate Treasury Shift

Phair suggested that interest in metals as treasury assets may have been influenced in part by the growing acceptance of Bitcoin as a corporate reserve asset, popularized by companies such as MicroStrategy.

“I feel like Michael Saylor did gold and silver a favor,” Phair said. “He talked about putting Bitcoin on your balance sheets as a treasury asset.”

That conversation, he said, may have prompted executives to reconsider what assets can be held on corporate balance sheets. “You can hold inventory of, let’s say you’re a furniture company or clothing or food, but you can also have euro, yen, the dollar, the Mexican peso,” he said. “Why can’t you have an asset?”

Some corporations have already laid the regulatory groundwork to hold alternative assets, he noted, pointing to Tesla’s filings that allowed the company to hold both Bitcoin and gold bullion.

“We had Tesla… the SEC bylaws were amended to hold Bitcoin and gold bullion at the same time,” Phair said.

While Tesla ultimately gained attention for its Bitcoin purchases, Phair said the regulatory infrastructure to hold metals is increasingly available to corporate treasuries.

Institutional Demand Rising

The potential entrance of corporations into the metals market adds to a wave of demand already coming from central banks and financial institutions. That institutional accumulation reflects deeper concerns about monetary stability and trust in financial systems, he added.

“While the US dollar really has no gold backing anymore since Richard Nixon cut the tie,” Phair said, “I think you’re watching people… saying, you know what, should we start having some sort of exposure to this asset class?”

Makori asked whether companies would require regulatory changes to hold precious metals as treasury assets. “Probably depends on the bylaws of your company,” Phair said.

Companies entering new asset classes generally must disclose the change to investors through filings and risk disclosures, he said. “If you’re entering a new arena, you typically have to disclose,” Phair said.

A Broader Shift in Financial Thinking

Phair said corporate adoption of precious metals may be part of a wider shift in how institutions think about balance sheet diversification. “This is a trend that the can is opening and the world is going to change,” he said.

The move toward metals, he added, reflects growing skepticism toward traditional financial systems.

“We no longer can trust the same institutions in the same way,” Phair said.

If the trend accelerates, corporate demand could add another powerful source of buying pressure to gold and silver markets already supported by central banks and sovereign buyers.