Bitcoin (BTC) and gold are showing very different profiles in 2026. Gold is up 153% since the start of 2024, while Bitcoin is down around 30% over the same period.
One analyst said the gap coincides with a steady boost in the global money supply, a decline in appetite for risky tech stocks and falling cryptocurrency exchange balances. Collectively, these changes shape how both assets perform in the market.
Increasing liquidity and speculation in tech stocks are not boosting Bitcoin
In post X, Fidelity’s director of global macro, Jurrien Timmer he said that gold has performed as expected during the bull market, and acute declines attract short-term buyers. Timmer described gold as a pure “hard money” asset that closely tracks the growth of the global money supply.
Bitcoin follows the global money supply growth over time, shown by the steady boost in global M2 (orange line). When M2 increases, BTC generally tends to boost. However, the chart shows that Bitcoin’s strongest gains occurred when the boost in liquidity matched the boost in software and software as a service (SaaS) stocks, each of which was an indicator of speculative appetite.
In 2017-2018 and again in 2020-2021, software stocks saw increases of approximately 58% and 93% year-over-year, with the price of Bitcoin rising sharply during these periods. In 2022, software stocks fell by approximately 58% and Bitcoin experienced a deep decline even as money supply levels remained high.
The data shows that growth in the money supply supports the long-term trend, while changes in speculation in the tech sector tend to amplify or dampen Bitcoin price swings. This means that Bitcoin has exposure to difficult money and has a high beta, amplifying moves in both directions.
Timmer noted that there is ample liquidity while speculative sentiment is in a bearish phase. In this scenario, the gold and money supply merged while Bitcoin struggled to keep pace.
Related: Bitcoin Threatens New Crash as US PPI Hits Highest in One Month
Gold attracts demand on cryptocurrency exchanges
Demand on crypto platforms he also turned around towards gold-related products. On January 5, Binance launched 24-hour, 7-day gold futures trading. Total volume for this product is approaching $35 billion, with over $4 billion recorded on its most lively day. According to cryptocurrency analyst Darkfost, weekly volume averages around $4.7 billion.
Activity accelerated right after gold saw a two-day correction of more than 20%. The spike highlights the need for tokenized exposure to classic difficult assets in cryptocurrency spaces.
At the same time, CryptoQuant data can be seen The total value of Binance’s portfolio, which includes BTC, ETH, XRP, and the main ERC20 and TRC20 stablecoins, has dropped to approximately $102 billion. This marks the lowest reading since April 2025, down from around $140 billion in August 2025.
The $38 billion decline reflects lower asset prices and users withdrawing from self-care during a period of bearish volatility.
In the case of Bitcoin, this means reduced capital on exchanges, which may signal cautious investor positioning and low liquidity in the tiny term.
Related: Bitcoin up to 30 thousand dollars? Analysts are debating when and at what price BTC will bottom out
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