coindesk.com
The narrative around Bitcoin being digital gold is beginning to “hinder” the cryptocurrency industry, said Gavin Michael, CEO of crypto exchange Bakkt (BKKT), while Galaxy Digital (GLXY.TO) CEO Mike Novogratz disagreed, calling Bitcoin “ready for primetime.”
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Bitcoin (BTC) “was designed as peer-to-peer electronic cash,” said Michael, speaking at the Barclays crypto conference, not as “replacement for gold in a vault.” While bitcoin may be able to function as digital gold, “there’s so much more we can get from it,” he said.
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Michael took note of El Salvador’s Bitcoin adoption, and Twitter enabling micropayments for tipping via crypto as giving him hope things are shifting back to Satoshi Nakamoto's original vision of Bitcoin as a peer-to-peer electronic payment system.
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Meanwhile, Galaxy Digital’s (GLXY.TO) CEO Michael Novogratz (speaking separately from Michael) continues to laud Bitcoin as digital gold, saying its primary use is as a hedge against “really bad fiscal stewardship.” He took note of recent currency collapses in Turkey and Russia, not to mention fiscal issues and money printing adventures in the U.S.
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Adoption is accelerating everywhere, said Novogratz, be it individuals, institutions, or pension funds. Bitcoin, he said, is “ready for primetime.”
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A research report from Bank of America last week spoke to the store-of-value proposition, noting bitcoin of late has been trading more like a risk asset, and less as an inflation hedge.
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The authors said the correlation between bitcoin and the S&P 500 rose to an all-time high at the end of January (though they acknowledge it’s decreased since). The correlation between bitcoin and gold, on the other hand, has been close to zero since last June.