Gold and Bitcoin Draw $7 Billion as Investors Turn to Scarce Assets

Gold and Bitcoin are attracting investors at the same time, with ETFs tracking the two assets seeing $7 billion of combined inflows over the past five trading days — a record for the period.

According to Bloomberg data, SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) pulled in around $3.4 billion, while BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) attracted about $1.5 billion. Both ranked among the top 10 US ETFs for weekly inflows.

The buying picked up after the US Treasury announced plans to at least double its purchases of longer-dated Treasuries. Long-term yields and the Dollar fell, while gold and Bitcoin jumped.

The bigger theme is the so-called “debasement trade”.

With US government debt now above $40 trillion, investors are increasingly looking for assets whose supply cannot be expanded as easily as fiat currencies. Gold has long played that role, while Bitcoin is increasingly being treated as a higher-risk version of the same trade.

Gold has gained around 13% this month, while Bitcoin has moved back above $80,000.

The interesting part is not simply that both are rising. The money is moving into the ETFs that give investors direct exposure to them.

If those flows continue, the recent rally in both gold and Bitcoin could have more room to run.