BitcoinOpinion
|4 min ReadWhy Bitcoin’s digital gold story trailed real gold
Jax Morales
Senior Analyst
Published
Jan 16, 2026
Central banks changed the game
The shock is simple. Gold surged more than 50% this year. Bitcoin is up about 15%. For five years, Bitcoin crushed gold by more than 1,000%. Then the script flipped. Why? Buyers changed. The biggest new bid is not retail or funds. It is central banks.
Global central banks have bought over 1,000 tons per year for three straight years. Recent tallies show Poland adding 18.66 tons, Kazakhstan 15.65 tons, and the PBOC 6.22 tons. The direction is one way. The message is loud.
Look at reserve mix. Developed markets are already saturated with bullion. The United States keeps 77.85% of reserves in gold, holding 8,133 tons. Germany holds 3,350 tons. Italy and France hold 2,452 and 2,437 tons. China’s gold is 2,299 tons, just 6.7% of reserves. Emerging markets have room to “catch up,” so they are buying. Central bank demand has jumped from under 10% of total demand in the 2000s to about 20% now. That is a real floor.
Why the rush? The world is messy. Sanctions risk is real. When a country’s FX can be frozen, only the bars in your own vault are truly yours. The United States faces roughly $36 trillion of federal debt, near 124% of GDP. Policy is noisy. Trust shifts. Gold does not default. It sits. In one volatile session, gold fell 5% and Bitcoin jumped. That is how fast the hedge baton can pass.
Bitcoin tracks tech, not bullion
Bitcoin’s old pitch was “digital gold.” The market now treats it like “digital Tesla.” Correlation with the Nasdaq sits near 0.5 and peaked around 0.8. Correlation with gold is near 0.2 and even hit zero at times. Translation. Bitcoin trades with growth stocks, not with bars.
The cause is clear. Spot ETFs brought Bitcoin into the dollar system. That was a milestone. It also tied flows to the same macro taps that move tech. BlackRock and friends are the largest marginal buyers. The Fed and the White House set the tone. Traders who once studied halvings now study dot plots and speeches. Everybody knows it. Integration brings legitimacy. It also brings beta.
Culturally, gold needs no pitch. Grandmothers own it. Bitcoin still needs evangelists. That is not bad. It means upside if the story broadens. But it explains why gold stole the spotlight while Bitcoin lagged.
Hold both, different vehicles, same purpose
This is not a forced choice. It is a pairing. Gold is a heavy store of value. It hedges regime risk. It is hard to move, hard to seize if well hidden, and it carries no counterparty. Bitcoin is a light store of value. It moves across borders at the speed of a QR code. When war or flight makes gold impractical, a hardware wallet can save a family. We already saw that once in Russia.
If central bank buying slows and storage frictions rise, capital will look for a cheaper, portable hedge with similar properties. That is where Bitcoin can reclaim the “digital gold” lane. As adoption deepens, its correlation can drift from tech toward scarcity again.
Gold is civilization’s memory of wealth. Bitcoin is the digital ambition for the next century. One anchors the past. One scouts the future. Smart hands learn to carry both.
Disclaimer: This document is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The views expressed in this document are not, and should not be taken as, investment advice or recommendations. Recipients should do their own due diligence, taking into account their specific financial circumstances, investment objectives and risk tolerance, which are not considered here, before investing. This document is not an offer, or the solicitation of an offer, to buy or sell any of the assets mentioned.