Jim Wiederhold, S&P Global’s associate director for commodities and real assets, has written in an opinion piece about bitcoin last week that BTC is reminiscent of the 1800sgold rush in the United States. His words were followed by a report saying bitcoin has become mainstream.
In his opinion piece, Wiederhold defended bitcoin by pointing it the enthusiasm surrounding it is similar to the enthusiasm that surrounded gold when its popularity exploded. He wrote:
The recent enthusiasm for bitcoin is reminiscent of the Gold Rush in the western U.S. from 1848-1860 … U.S. enthusiasm for gold exploded over this time period.
The analysts added that parallels between bitcoin and gold have grown. Per his words, both assets are scarce and have the “potential to be held outside of conventional financial markets,” while being good inflation hedges.
Moreover, Wiederhold added that both assets are “uncorrelated to other popular asset classes” in investors’ portfolios, but noted bitcoin’s volatility over the last five years has been multiple times higher than the volatility seen in other asset classes.
On top of that, the analyst pointed out that while bitcoin has a supply limit and concerns surrounding bitcoin theft have been fading away as the cryptocurrency becomes more mainstream, there are “lingering technology and exchange counterparty risks.”
Gold is an established asset, he said, while bitcoin is still in its infancy but “slowly becoming more easily accessible to mainstream investors.” S&P Global itself, as Bitcoin.com reports, has also recently published a report on BTC.
The report points out bitcoin’s popularity has been growing. It reads:
Once considered an alternative trend, cryptocurrencies have become mainstream and appear here to stay.
The report also points out cryptocurrencies “may appear to be a niche or experimental segment” for companies investing in them, but “industry experts say they are treating it with increasing seriousness.”
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