Bitcoin Runs Into Russian Rules, Regiments Amid High Geopolitical Tension

ndtv.com:

Bitcoin has slipped towards levels of around $42,000 in recent days.

Bristling tensions and looming laws in Europe could offer clues to two questions: Can bitcoin be a safe-haven asset? And can Russia emerge as a crypto superpower?

The answer to the first, for now at least, is no; while fortress gold has risen 2.3% over the past week, as Western warnings about Russian aggression have intensified, bitcoin has lost 3%. That was worse than the 0.9% decline of the Nasdaq Composite index.

"I don't see any evidence of bitcoin being a safe haven," said Chris Weston, head of research at Melbourne-based brokerage Pepperstone. "The Ukraine situation with Russia is a really hard one to price, so in that situation, you just buy crude futures."

Yet it's too early to dismiss the argument made by many bitcoin advocates who say the cryptocurrency, just into its teens, is destined to be a form of digital gold that should retain its value when riskier assets such as stocks tumble.

While bitcoin has slipped towards levels of around $42,000 in recent days, it hasn't surrendered all the gains made from lows of $32,950 hit on January 24.

Some investors also point to how relatively calm trading has been, at a time of high geopolitical tension, with Russia having massed more than 100,000 troops near Ukraine, though rejecting Western prophecies of invasion as "hysteria".

Bitcoin's average 30-day volatility has fallen to 3.48%, versus its 2021 average of 4.56%, according to BuyBitcoinWorldwide's volatility index.

Data platform Coinglass' bitcoin Fear & Greed index, which measures market sentiment - 0 indicates extreme fear and 100 is extreme greed - stands at 46, above the nervy 11-33 range where it had been trading since late November.

Matthew Dibb,