Bitcoin has actually only taken 2% of gold market cap
Getting to 10% of gold's market cap would mean that each bitcoin costs $154,000, says CryptoQuant. Bitcoin (BTC) has much further to go to suck away even 10% of gold’s market cap than old data claims, a popular indicator reveals.
Highlighting numbers from Bitcoin’s realized cap on Jan. 12, Ki Young Ju, CEO of on-chain analytics resource CryptoQuant, said that the cryptocurrency had taken far less of gold’s market cap than previously claimed.
Realized cap cools Bitcoin numbers game
As Bitcoin grew in price towards the end of 2020 and hit all-time highs of $42,000 last week, a narrative appeared that investors were swapping gold for BTC, and that Bitcoin had thus taken around 7% of the precious metal’s market cap of $10 trillion.
Using realized cap, which calculates market cap in a different, more precise manner, the real “theft” from gold actually stands at 2%, says Ki.
Unlike market cap, the metric measures the price at which each bitcoin last moved, and excludes coins on centralized custodial exchanges, thus excluding speculative movements. The total is also kept lower by long-lost BTC, which will have last moved at likely far lower prices than today’s.
“People said $BTC took 7% of the Gold market cap. No, it's not. There are unclaimed, unreachable, and lost Bitcoins. Based on the realized cap, it's just 2%,” he tweeted alongside a realized cap chart. “If digital gold replaces 10% of the $XAU market cap then the $BTC price would be $154k.”
Bitcoin’s realized cap stood at $227 billion on Wednesday, while its standard market cap was $645 billion.
BTC performance beats gold fair and square
Despite its arguably slower progress, Bitcoin is still faring extremely well against gold, which failed to recoup its losses in BTC terms even as BTC/USD dropped to near $30,000 on Monday. Bitcoin bought 18.6 ounces of the precious metal at publishing time, according to data from Buy Bitcoin Worldwide.
Bitcoin’s correlation to gold was trending towards zero this week, down markedly from highs seen in October. Previously, commentators noted that Bitcoin has already transferred all of gold’s $10 trillion market cap in its 12-year history. As Cointelegraph reported, however, criticism from gold fans remains, with gold bug Peter Schiff casting doubt on both Bitcoin’s status as a safe haven and institutional investors’ interest in it.
“Bitcoin traded near $42K on Friday and near $30K on Monday. An asset that drops 28% over a weekend is not a safe-haven, a store of value, or a viable hedge against #inflation,” he tweeted this week. “If you want to gamble on #Bitcoin, buy Bitcoin. But if you want to hedge against inflation buy #gold.”
Top Cryptocurrencies with Price Predictions
| # | Crypto | Prediction | Accuracy | CVIX | Price | 24h | 7d | Market Cap | 7d price change | |
| 1 |  BTC |
Bitcoin predictions | 78.4% | 35 | $22 994.25 | -3.54% | 0.01% | $439 591 538 662 |  |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 |  ETH |
Ethereum predictions | 68.8% | 68 | $1 687.91 | -5.10% | 3.56% | $205 761 571 724 |  |
|
| 3 |  USDT |
Tether predictions | 95.6% | 1 | $1.000205 | 0% | 0% | $66 531 586 544 |  |
|
| 4 |  USDC |
USD Coin predictions | 96% | 1 | $1.000033 | 0.02% | -0.01% | $54 021 851 086 |  |
|
| 5 |  BNB |
Binance Coin predictions | 71.2% | 62 | $322.84 | -0.68% | 11.75% | $52 086 335 344 |  |
|
| 6 |  BUSD |
Binance USD predictions | 95.2% | 1 | $1.000068 | 0% | 0.01% | $17 752 502 175 |  |
|
| 7 |  XRP |
XRP predictions | 77.6% | 36 | $0.363424 | -3.65% | -1.50% | $17 569 045 535 |  |
|
| 8 |  ADA |
Cardano predictions | 72% | 50 | $0.511389 | -4.25% | 1.61% | $17 253 774 183 |  |
|
| 9 |  SOL |
Solana predictions | 73.6% | 44 | $39.74 | -6.33% | 3.54% | $13 844 600 613 |  |
|
| 10 |  STETH |
Lido stETH predictions | 93.6% | 1 | $2 941.39 | -0.40% | -3.32% | $10 258 752 564 |  |
|
| 11 |  DOT |
Polkadot predictions | 68.8% | 62 | $8.71 | -4.69% | 9.10% | $9 626 327 113 |  |
|
| 12 |  HEX |
HEX predictions | 64.8% | 70 | $0.054592 | -1.19% | 18.95% | $9 466 937 752 |  |
|
| 13 |  DOGE |
Dogecoin predictions | 81.6% | 28 | $0.068228 | -6.49% | 1.79% | $9 051 914 563 |  |
|
| 14 |  AVAX |
Avalanche predictions | 70.4% | 55 | $27.42 | -3.30% | 17.24% | $7 814 089 843 |  |
|
| 15 |  DAI |
Dai predictions | 92% | 1 | $0.999863 | 0.05% | 0.03% | $7 525 054 582 |  |
