Bitcoin (BTC), having closed 2021 with 66.5% gains in total returns, has been the best performing asset class for the third year in a row. Bitcoin outperformed 16 other asset classes including age-old investment vehicles like gold, commodities, and U.S. treasuries and bonds.
The data, which was highlighted by the founder and CEO of Compound Capital Advisors, Charlie Bilello, showed that Bitcoin has performed spectacularly well in the last decade.
Bitcoin’s performance against competitors is unmatched
According to the chart, Bitcoin was followed by commodities, which had a 41.4% return in 2021. US Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITS) clocked in as the third-best performing asset by returns with a return of 40.5%.
Gold, the other leading inflation hedge asset that Bitcoin continues to be compared to, ranked in 16th place in total returns with a negative total return of 4.1%, only performing better than Long Duration Treasuries, which recorded a 4.6% return in 2021.
The last three years have not been the only years where Bitcoin dominated other asset classes. Bitcoin has been the best performing asset in nine out of the last 11 years, only being outperformed by US REITS and U.S. Cash in 2014 and 2018 respectively. However, in this time frame, Bitcoin has still been the best performing asset, having amassed a cumulative total return of over 1 million percent, and an annualized total return of 197.2%.
The forecast for Bitcoin in 2022
While Bitcoin did not reach the $100,000 target most analysts predicted for 2021 due to persisting market volatility, many market participants are still highly bullish for the benchmark cryptocurrency in 2022.
Several catalysts are expected to push Bitcoin’s price to new highs this year. One of these is the anticipated approval of a Bitcoin spot exchange-traded fund (ETF). The SEC spent last year postponing decisions on and denying several Bitcoin spot ETFs, but market participants expect that they will no longer be able to stall an approval in 2022.
Additionally, there is high anticipation that more nation-states and institutional investors will adopt Bitcoin this year. The president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, has predicted that this year two more countries will join his country in adopting Bitcoin as legal tender. This adoption will also drive the price of Bitcoin to $100,000 according to the president’s prediction.
The alarming inflation rate, which is currently at 6.2% in the US, is also very bullish for Bitcoin according to analysts. From our recent report, Antoni Trenchev, the founder of crypto lending platform, Nexo, predicted that Bitcoin would reach a price of $100,000 by the middle of 2022. For Trenchev, the Fed’s move to introduce a rate hike to battle inflation would only cause a dip in the stock market that would drive the price of Bitcoin up.
