Bitcoin’s recent price drop proves it’s not a ‘safe haven’ investment

Bitcoin, a digital cryptocurrency born in 2009 on the heels of the last major financial crisis, has long been propped up by the idea that it is akin to digital gold. It’s been regarded as a “safe haven” type of investment, something that you can safely pack your money into when stock prices are falling. 

Judging by the price action in the past couple of weeks, however, Bitcoin is definitely not that — at least, not yet. 

In just two days, the price of Bitcoin has halved, going from around $8,000 to about $4,000, according to CoinMarketCap (the price actually went even lower on individual exchanges such as Coinbase). The prices of other cryptocurrencies followed suit, most with even bigger losses. 

Image: coinbase

And while reasons behind crypto price changes have often been arcane, this time they’re not very hard to guess: Bitcoin was merely following other risk-on assets such as stocks, which have been plummeting due to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. In the last two days, the S&P index, which tracks 500 major U.S. companies, has dropped from about 2,900 to 2,500. It’s not as steep a drop as Bitcoin’s, but it is absolutely crushing and comparable to the largest market crashes in history. 

In finance, a risk-on asset is an asset that’s volatile and inherently risky, including stocks and commodities. A risk-off asset is something that doesn’t typically yield massive returns, but will likely hold up well in times of crisis, and this includes low-yield government bonds, cash, and, to a degree, gold. While gold is often itself too volatile to be considered a risk-off asset, it’s been a good haven in times of crisis; for example, its price held up fairly well during the subprime mortgage financial crisis of 2007-2009. 

Bitcoin, having been launched after that crisis, was thriving during the longest bull run in history — an 11-year period in which stock prices rose basically without a pause. The theory that it was a risk-off asset, or at least a hedge for potentially falling stock prices, went untested until a few days ago. 

Bitcoin’s sharp price drop has caught some of its proponents off guard. Brian Armstrong, the