Gold and Bitcoin Price Fork: Market Performance and Reasons Analysis
Recently, gold and Bitcoin price The trend shows significant differentiation, with gold continuing to hit historical highs, while Bitcoin is oscillating at high levels or even experiencing a slight pullback, forming a market phenomenon known as ‘forking’. This differentiation not only reflects the fundamental differences in the asset attributes of the two, but also reveals the complex impact of the current macroeconomic environment and market sentiment on different investment targets. This article will integrate the recent market performance of gold and Bitcoin, and delve into the driving factors behind them.
1. Recent Market Performance of Gold and Bitcoin
1. Gold: Safe-haven shine
Gold continued its upward momentum from last year at the beginning of 2025, breaking through $3100 per ounce and setting a new historical high. As of early April, the price of gold fluctuated within the range of $3100-3160, demonstrating a strong bullish trend. The specific performance is as follows:
Price dynamics: Gold prices have risen by about 15% year-to-date, far outperforming most traditional assets. In recent trading days, the daily price fluctuation of gold is between 0.5% and 1%, showing a relatively stable upward trend.
Market momentum: Gold ETF holdings continue to increase, with strong global physical gold demand (especially in Asian markets). The open interest of COMEX gold futures is also at a high level, reflecting a strong bullish sentiment in the market.
Key events: Geopolitical tensions (such as the situation in the Middle East, escalating trade frictions between China and the U.S.) have increased safe-haven demand; multiple central banks (such as China, India) are increasing their gold reserves, providing solid support for the gold price.
The strong performance of gold makes it the first choice in the current market, especially against the backdrop of increasing global economic uncertainty, investors see it as a “safe haven”.
2. Bitcoin: high-level oscillation, lack of momentum
In contrast, Bitcoin’s performance appears weak. By the end of 2024, the price of Bitcoin once broke through $90,000, but since the beginning of 2025, it has been fluctuating in the range of $70,000 to $82,000, and even recently experienced a slight decline (about 1.2% on a certain trading day). The specific performance is as follows:
Price dynamics: Bitcoin has risen by about 5% so far this year, much lower than last year’s explosive growth. The daily price fluctuation ranges from 3% to 5%, highlighting its high volatility and speculative nature.
Market momentum: On-chain transaction volume is sluggish, the activity of new projects is declining, and the market lacks new capital inflows. Bitcoin has a high correlation with tech stocks (about 0.66), recent adjustments in the US stock market (with some trading days seeing a decline of over 4%) have dragged down its performance.
Key events: Regulatory pressure (such as the SEC’s review of exchanges) dampens investor enthusiasm; Market expectations for policy favors (such as Trump’s crypto-friendly stance) have not materialized. Bitcoin failed to continue last year’s rally, reflecting the challenges it faces as a risk asset in the current market environment.
3. Comparison and Forking Phenomenon
The correlation between gold and Bitcoin has recently risen (from a negative value at the beginning of the year to about 0.26), but overall it remains unstable. The steady rise in the price of gold contrasts sharply with the high-level fluctuations of Bitcoin, and the flow of funds also shows that investors prefer safe-haven assets over speculative assets. Behind this “fork” phenomenon, there are both the driving force of macroeconomic logic and the game of micro-market sentiment.
2. Analysis of the reasons for price forking
1. The fundamental difference in asset attributes
Gold, as a traditional safe-haven asset, is often favored in times of economic uncertainty, inflation expectations, or currency depreciation. Its price is driven by physical demand (such as central bank purchases, jewelry consumption) and safe-haven fund inflows, with relatively moderate fluctuations. In contrast, although Bitcoin is sometimes referred to as ‘digital gold’, its nature is closer to high-risk assets, highly correlated with tech stocks and speculative investments. When market risk appetite decreases (such as US stock market corrections or liquidity tightening), Bitcoin is often under pressure. Case in point: recent escalation of geopolitical conflicts (such as deteriorating situation in Ukraine) has boosted demand for gold, while Bitcoin has failed to rise in sync due to selling pressure on risky assets.
2. The Impact of Macroeconomics and Monetary Policy
The macro environment affects gold and Bitcoin differently:
USD trend: The recent drop in the USD index to a near three-year low (around 100.2) directly drives the price of gold higher due to its negative correlation (around -0.8). Bitcoin has a weaker correlation with the USD (around 0.1) and is more driven by internal dynamics within the crypto market.
Fed policy: The market’s repeated adjustments to the Fed’s rate cut expectations have affected the performance of both. The warming of rate cut expectations is usually positive for gold (reducing holding costs), but the impact on Bitcoin is complex, as it may benefit from the warming of risk assets, or fall due to short-term selling.
Inflation and Economic Expectations: Global inflation expectations have declined somewhat, but long-term concerns still support the attractiveness of gold as an inflation hedge asset. Bitcoin, on the other hand, has a blurred role in the logic of inflation due to the lack of stable value anchoring.
Reasons for differentiation: the weakening of the US dollar and safe-haven demand directly boosted gold, while Bitcoin failed to benefit from the same macro logic.
3. The difference between market sentiment and speculative behavior
The price of gold is driven by long-term investment logic, and market participants (such as central banks, institutions) tend to hold stable positions, with demand being ‘rigid.’ Bitcoin, on the other hand, is highly speculative, with prices influenced by retail investors, institutions, and ‘whale’ behavior, making it prone to drastic fluctuations due to market sentiment. Recently, the crypto market has lost momentum due to regulatory news, sluggish on-chain data (such as a decrease in large transfers), while gold has continued to rise due to increasing risk aversion.
Case: Gold maintains its upward trend due to central bank buying and ETF inflows, while Bitcoin’s attractiveness is declining due to the lack of new narratives (such as the fading ETF craze last year).
4. Specific event-driven differentiation
Gold: Geopolitical risks (such as Middle East tensions) directly boost safe-haven demand; central banks of various countries have accumulated over 1000 tons of gold purchases in 2024, setting a historical record, providing long-term support for the gold price.
Bitcoin: Internal events in the crypto market (such as tightening regulations in certain countries, exchange turmoil) have dented investor confidence; technical adjustments (Bitcoin facing resistance near $90,000) have also intensified short-term pullback pressure.
Three, Future Outlook and Investment Insights
The fork in the prices of gold and Bitcoin reflects the complexity of the current market environment: gold benefits from safe-haven logic and traditional financial demand, while Bitcoin is limited by insufficient risk appetite and speculative momentum. Looking ahead:
Gold: If geopolitical risks persist or the US dollar weakens further, the price of gold may challenge $3200/ounce. However, we need to be vigilant about the potential pullback risks from the Federal Reserve’s policy shift (such as unexpected interest rate hikes).
Bitcoin: If risk appetite rebounds (such as a rebound in US stocks or the implementation of crypto-friendly policies), Bitcoin may break through $85,000 and regain its upward momentum. However, regulatory uncertainty and technical resistance (downtrend line) remain short-term challenges.
Relevance trend: The correlation between the two may strengthen in specific scenarios (such as global liquidity easing), but differentiation is expected to persist in the short term.
For investors, gold is suitable as a core safe-haven allocation to deal with uncertainty; Bitcoin is more suitable for high-risk preference traders, who need to closely monitor policy and market sentiment changes. The two are not a zero-sum game, but reflect the coexistence of different investment logics.
