Traders’ off Bitcoin, capital flows into gold, AI and tech stocks
Bitcoin (BTC) and gold are showing very different profiles in 2026. Gold is up 153 percent since the start of 2024, while bitcoin is down 30 percent over the same period.
One analyst attributed the gap to continued growth in the global money supply, cooling appetite for riskier tech stocks and shrinking crypto exchange balances. Together, these changes are shaping how both assets are traded in the market.
The increasing amount of liquidity and technological speculations failed to fill Bitcoin
According to Jurien Timmer, Director of Global Macro Fidelity at XPost, gold has behaved as expected in a bull market, with sharp pullbacks attracting short-term buyers. Timmer described gold as a pure “hard money” asset that closely tracks the growth of the global money supply.
Bitcoin tracks the growth of the global money supply over time, showing a constant increase in global M2 (orange line). As M2 expanded, BTC generally trended higher. However, the chart shows that Bitcoin's strongest rallies have occurred when liquidity growth coincides with rising software and software-as-a-service (SaaS) stocks, each a proxy for speculative appetite.
In 2017–2018 and again in 2020–2021, software stocks posted year-over-year gains of about 58% and 93%, respectively, and the price of Bitcoin increased significantly during those periods. In the year In 2022, software stocks fell by around 58%, and even as the money supply level rose, Bitcoin experienced a deep decline.
The data shows that money supply growth supports the long-term trend, and changes in tech-sector speculation will boost or weaken Bitcoin's price growth. This indicates that Bitcoin retains the characteristics of hard currency exposure and high beta, highlighting movements in both directions.
Liquidity is sufficient when speculative sentiment is at bearish levels, Timmer said. In this scenario, the supply of gold and money have rallied together, while Bitcoin has struggled to keep pace.
Related: US PPI threatens fresh crash as gold sends gold to 1-month high
Gold attracts interest in crypto exchange
Interest in crypto-native platforms has also turned to gold-related products. On January 5, Binance launched 24-hour, 7-day gold futures trading. The total volume of this product is approaching $35 billion, with more than $4 billion recorded on the most active day. According to crypto analyst Darkfost, the weekly volume averages around $4.7 billion.
After gold posted a two-day correction of more than 20%, the movement immediately accelerated. The spike reflects interest in token exposure to traditional hard assets in the crypto space.
At the same time, CryptoQuant data shows that the value of Binance's total portfolio of BTC, ETH, XRP and major ERC20 and TRC20 stablecoins has dropped to about $102 billion. That's the lowest reading since April 2025, compared with $140 billion in August 2025.
A $38 billion decline in lower asset prices and consumer outages shows self-preservation during depressed volatility.
For Bitcoin, this suggests a reduction in exchange capital, which may indicate cautious trading positions and thin liquidity.
Related: Bitcoin To $30K? Analysts debate when and at what price BTC will depreciate.
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