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☆ Weekend plunge shows it's premature to crown bitcoin as the new gold, Citi says
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-16 | by ( Tanaya Macheel | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Citi says it may be too early to classify bitcoin as "digital gold" despite its safe haven properties and recent correlation with the yellow metal. Many bitcoin fans regard the cryptocurrency as a digital version of gold because of its finite supply and its function as a store of value. Citi analyst Alex Saunders acknowledged that it can and has displayed both safe haven and risk asset behaviors, but said the digital gold analogy isn't yet warranted. Bitcoin does not yet exhibit the 'store-of-value' properties of gold, despite both being limited-supply, zero-coupon-bearing instruments." "Adoption of the emergent blockchain technology will be key to the long-term utility of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies," he added.

Persons: Alex Saunders, –, Saunders, bitcoin, Michael Bloom Organizations: Citi Locations: East

☆ What investors need to know about ‘Dencun,’ Ethereum’s next big tech upgrade
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-12 | by ( Tanaya Macheel | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Relative to bitcoin , the initial price action following the upgrade is even weaker historically, with ether underperforming 80% of the time in the first 20 days, Saunders added. Saunders warned, however, that the trading environment for crypto is different today than it was during previous Ethereum network upgrades. The scalability problem Dencun follows the "Shapella" upgrade from almost a year ago, which allowed investors to withdraw their staked ether from the network for the first time. This upgrade is focused on the longer-term goal of enhancing Ethereum's ability to handle more activity and transactions as the network grows. "The Dencun upgrade serves as an important step in addressing this congestion, which hurts users and developers alike."

Persons: Alex Saunders, Saunders, Philipp Zentner, bitcoin –, Duncan Ash, Michael Bloom Organizations: BTC, Citi, ETH, Metrics, Securities and Exchange Commission Locations: U.S

☆ Launch of new ETFs may not affect bitcoin the same way they did gold, Citi says. Here’s why
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-30 | by ( Tanaya Macheel | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

The launch of spot bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. has been widely anticipated for months, with many investors thinking they could revolutionize investing in the asset the way the SPDR Gold Shares ETF (GLD) did for gold in 2004. Bernstein recently said bitcoin could rocket to $200,000 by the end of next year with bitcoin ETFs. "It still took bullion ETFs several years to crystalize holdings and AUM that structurally impacted spot gold prices and lifted trading," Saunders said. Additionally, bitcoin is newer and less established than gold was before the introduction of gold ETFs, he added. Last year, that correlation fell to its lowest since 2021 , while bitcoin's correlation with gold has been climbing.

Persons: Bernstein, Alex Saunders, Saunders, they're, … bitcoin, bitcoin Organizations: Citi Locations: U.S

☆ Bitcoin ETFs aren't giving crypto a big boost just yet. Here's where the new funds stand
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-22 | by ( Jesse Pound | In Jesse-Pound | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

The newly launched bitcoin exchange-traded funds are showing early signs of success, but they have so far fallen short of being the massive boost for crypto some bulls predicted. BTC.CM= YTD mountain Bitcoin has retreated since the launch of the bitcoin ETFs. This fall comes after some crypto investors had cited the ETF launches as a catalyst that could propel bitcoin to $100,000 in 2024. That discount likely attracted arbitrage players who used the ETF launch as an opportunity to close out their trade. Yesterday, all Bitcoin ETFs combined traded $2.2Bn, IBIT traded $340Mn.

Persons: Alex Saunders, Benjamin Budish, Aniket Ullal, Ullal, It's, Bernstein, Gautam Chhugani Organizations: U.S . Securities, Exchange Commission, Fidelity, Citi, Barclays, CFRA Research, IBIT Locations: bitcoin, GBTC

☆ Citi analysis shows your 60/40 portfolio could have been helped with a little bitcoin
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-25 | by ( Tanaya Macheel | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

If you held some bitcoin in your 60/40 portfolio back in 2014, you might have gotten a nice lift from the then-shadowy cryptocurrency, according to a Citi analysis of bitcoin returns. That return rose to 7.42% when analysts added a 1% allocation toward bitcoin. When committing 5% of the portfolio to the flagship cryptocurrency, that return rose to 9.3%, Citi analyst Alex Saunders said in a recent note. "Historically speaking, an allocation to Bitcoin would have enhanced portfolio returns," Saunders said in an Oct. 20 report. The firm also determined that to justify a 5% bitcoin allocation to a 60/40 portfolio, the cryptocurrency would need to generate annualized returns of 12% to 16%.

Persons: bitcoin, Alex Saunders, Saunders, Crypto, it's, CNBC's Michael Bloom Organizations: Citi, U.S Locations: U.S

☆ U.S. stocks price in recession risk more than other assets, says Citi
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-19 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

"No asset class is over pricing the recession risk. But in relative terms, U.S. equities have the most recession risk priced in," a Citigroup team led by Alex Saunders said in a note dated Tuesday, adding earnings estimates had more to adjust. U.S. bonds had priced the least risk of a recession, the Wall Street bank said. "Bonds may have to wait for longer this time around to price recession risk given that the Fed will remain hawkish for longer than typical," the team wrote. Industrials and financials are not factoring in enough recession risk among sectors, Citigroup said, with consumer discretionary the least risk priced in.

Japanese yen and U.S. dollar banknotes are seen with a currency exchange rate graph in this illustration picture taken June 16, 2022. "Japanese households have a thousand trillion in yen deposits. As of June, households had 1,102 trillion yen ($7.7 trillion) in cash and deposits, while private non-financial companies had 325 trillion yen. "There is a risk of what I call capital flight by Japanese households," said Tohru Sasaki, head of Japan markets research at J.P. Morgan Securities in Tokyo. In January 2006, when spreads between U.S. and Japan were at their widest at roughly 440 bps, Japanese households had 1,631 trillion yen of assets.

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