BlackRock’s Larry Fink touts Bitcoin as digital gold — these wild swings are a reality check

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Happy Friday, Trista here.

BlackRock’s Larry Fink famously touts Bitcoin as digital gold. But this week was yet another reminder that Bitcoin — and indeed, crypto in general — behaves as anything but.

Gold on Friday hit $3,000 an ounce for the first time.

Trump’s zig-zagging tariff policies are giving investors whiplash, driving them into havens like gold.

The precious metal has spiked and so has Wall Street’s “fear gauge,” the VIX, which is up 57% over the past month.

Words like “correction” and “recession” are popping up an awful lot — alongside more colourful terms like “psychodrama.”

Investors are dumping risky assets at levels not seen since the Covid-19 pandemic.

The S&P 500 is down more than 8% from its February 19 record, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq has plunged about 12% from a recent high.

All of this upheaval should, in theory, send investors to Bitcoin. It’s a finite asset, it’s never been hacked, and backers like Fink claim it’s a great hedge against currency debasement and geopolitical strife.

And yet, time and again, Bitcoin’s price behaves just like a tech stock on the Nasdaq.

The trend has not gone unnoticed. The ETF Store’s Nate Geraci said on X: “If Bitcoin equals ‘digital gold,’ then time to act like it. Otherwise, it will reinforce the narrative that it’s simply a high beta asset.”

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