Gold hits new all-time-high at $2,700 amidst bullish Bitcoin

Gold has surged more than 2% over the past week, reaching a new all-time high of $2,700 per ounce on October 18. This increase is driven by growing demand for safe-haven assets, particularly amid fears of geopolitical instability and expectations of interest rate cuts by central banks. The European Central Bank has reduced rates three times this year, most recently lowering the deposit rate to 3.25%.

In addition to central bank policies, gold has been impacted by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, especially after the Israeli military’s confirmation on October 17 of the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, which has raised concerns of further regional escalation.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin has also been climbing steadily, recently surpassing $67,000. Over the past week, Bitcoin saw an 11% increase, briefly touching a two-month high of $68,375 on October 16.

Charles Edwards, co-founder of Capriole Investments, commented on the similarity between the upward trends of gold and Bitcoin, noting that Bitcoin’s macro trends often follow gold by a few months, making the current outlook promising for Bitcoin as well.

In recent years, investors have increasingly drawn comparisons between Gold and Bitcoin due to the similarities in their market behavior. Both assets are finite in supply and are not tied to any national currency, making them attractive as safe-haven assets that protect investors from the volatility of traditional currencies.

As a result, Bitcoin has earned the moniker of “digital gold”. However, a major development is now bringing this comparison to life in a new way. Swarm Market, a real-world asset (RWA) platform, has made it possible to mint and trade physical gold on the Bitcoin blockchain using the Ordinals protocol.

On October 17, Swarm Market announced a partnership with OrdinalsBot, allowing individual satoshis (the smallest unit of Bitcoin) to be inscribed with unique serial numbers corresponding to gold kilobars. This innovation enables the tokenization of physical gold, allowing gold bars to be traded on Bitcoin’s Ordinals protocol.

Through this partnership, gold will become the first real-world asset (RWA) available on Trio, a marketplace being developed by OrdinalsBot. Trio is set to launch by the end of the year, opening up new possibilities for how physical assets can be represented and traded on the Bitcoin network.