Bitcoin, the cryptocurrency created just over a decade ago that has been ridiculed by many, has once again achieved a massive milestone by entering the noteworthy top 10 list of the largest assets by market capitalization.
With its most recent rally, BTC has become a trillion-dollar asset, surpassing the likes of Berkshire and TSMC while leaving giants like Tesla, Visa, and JPM far in its rear-view mirror.
Bitcoin Enters Top 10
It’s safe to say that Bitcoin’s dark days of 2022 and early 2023 are behind it. The asset had slumped to under $20,000 following the industry-wide crashes and numerous bankruptcies, as well as macroeconomic events like wars, increasing interest rates, and inflation.
However, the landscape started to change in mid-2023 when BlackRock filed to launch a spot Bitcoin ETF. Numerous financial giants followed suit, and the narrative regarding such products changed to “It’s a matter of when not if.” That when arrived in early 2024, but BTC had already soared past $40,000 on the hype of those ETFs.
After a brief but violent correction, Bitcoin started regaining value once again, especially in late January and February. The past few weeks have been particularly favorable for the asset, which soared from $44,000 on February 7 to over $60,000 earlier today. As such, the cryptocurrency charted its highest price tag since November 2021 and its market capitalization skyrocketed to $1.185 trillion.
This means that Bitcoin is not only the largest cryptocurrency by market cap, but it has also entered a notable list on that manner among all types of financial assets. Data from CompaniesMarketCap shows that Bitcoin is currently the 10th largest asset in terms of market cap, standing ahead of behemoths like Berkshire Hathaway and the largest banking organization on Earth – JPMorgan Chase.
What’s particularly interesting about those two giants is that their leaders – Warren Buffett and Jamie Dimon – have been bashing Bitcoin for years, calling it everything from “rat poison squared” to “a useless pet rock.”
What’s Next?
As the graph above demonstrates, Bitcoin is not far behind Meta (Facebook) and the second-biggest commodity – silver. However, the road ahead seems more challenging as Alphabet, Amazon, NVIDIA, and Saudi Aramco are with market caps higher by more than $500 billion. The two largest companies – Microsoft and Apple – are even further away, with market caps of $3 trillion and $2.8 trillion, respectively.
To be able to surpass them, BTC’s market cap would almost need to triple from its current position. And, although it seems a bit far-fetched at the moment, Bitcoin’s market capitalization would have to skyrocket by more than 1,000% to claim the first spot in this marvelous list from gold.
The yellow metal has a market cap of nearly $14 trillion. To put the unfathomable difficulty of this into perspective, BTC’s price will be at $700,000 (or a 1,066% surge).
Nevertheless, there are some early signs that Bitcoin could be taking away from gold’s market share, at least in terms of ETFs. Additionally, many industry experts have predicted that the cryptocurrency will outperform the precious metal in the next decade. Yet, such a price tag is beyond the reasonable imagination, at least for now.
This doesn’t change the fact that Bitcoin – declared dead nearly 500 times in its 15-year existence – has once again become a top 10 asset by market cap. Let’s enjoy that for now and worry about Alphabet, NVIDIA, Apple, and gold later.
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