Oil shock splits gold and bitcoin’s paths

OIL is the big story at the moment, but the real signal is in how markets are choosing their safe haven.Since the US launched Operation Epic Fury, its bombing against Iran that began on February 28, Brent crude has surged more than 50% in under three weeks. It’s been one of the most violent oil price spikes on record, the kind that reprices everything downstream on a global scale, including logistics, food, inflation expectations and Federal Reserve rate cut expectations.Professional traders now expect US inflation to hit 3.2% over the next year, up from 2.2% before the conflict. That’s according to one-year inflation swaps, which are financial contracts that allow traders to bet on where prices will be in 12 months — and it’s already complicating investor expectations of the Fed’s rate-cutting outlook for 2026.It’s all been fairly straightforward economics: oil shocks lead to inflation fears, which heighten fears of tighter monetary policy. There has been a somewhat counterintuitive development in certain parts of the market, though.Gold and bitcoin have parted ways.The precious metal was the clear winner during the long buildup to the latest conflict in the Middle East. But bitcoin has outperformed stocks and gold since the situation escalated. Bitcoin is up roughly 13% since February 28. Gold is down more than 12% from those levels and sits 17% below its January highs. Granted, past performance is in no way indicative of future performance.The correlation coefficient, a measure of whether two assets are moving together or apart, between bitcoin and gold has dropped to multiyear lows since the conflict began. In past years, the two assets tracked each other relatively closely. This correlation began inverting in October 2025 and has recently reached its lowest level since November 2022.Decouplings this sharp tend to attract asset managers’ attention. When two assets that usually rhyme suddenly diverge, it creates new options to diversify.The general working theory is that the gold market is under pressure from rising inflation expectations, combined with the view that the Fed can’t cut rates as aggressively as markets had hoped. And so, investors could be eyeing yield-bearing investments rather than gold in the current climate.Bitcoin, despite slipping after the Fed’s most recent meeting, has found support in a fresh wave of institutional conviction after the correction earlier this year.As oil prices spark new inflation fears, could more investors be looking at bitcoin as a scarce asset that doesn’t rely on the dollar? Or is it a case of two markets correcting in separate directions? It’s an open question many investors are asking themselves.De Wit is country manager for Luno South AfricaThe post Oil shock splits gold and bitcoin’s paths appeared first on Miningmx.Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com