Is Bitcoin Decoupling? | Round Table Clip

22 Apr 2025 · 5:27

In this Round Table clip from 0xResearch, Blockworks Research analysts debate whether Bitcoin is decoupling from broader risk assets and traditional market correlations. The short discussion touches on shifting market structure and what a genuine decoupling would mean for how Bitcoin and the wider crypto market get priced going forward.

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Transcript

All right, let's let's jump into it. Um, I don't have a lot to talk about on markets. I think it's it's been a lot of the same back and forth stuff. Um, people talking about tariffs, people talking about this, that, and the other thing. The one the one maybe topic I do want to pull up again is um, you know, our resident macro GCR Felix had dropped his own piece on, you know, related to Bitcoin and and macro and other things. Um, and I'm seeing talk that we saw a few weeks back around BTC decoupling from, you know, equities or, you know, US equities. Um, we're seeing I'm seeing that crop up again, like, you know, the the stock market is is down today and Bitcoin is up. So, um, people are kind of reiterating that point. I guess I'm curious, what are you guys thoughts

here? You know, we've I think we've talked on this point a little bit, but I just want to know what people are thinking. Yeah, shout out to Felix for the perfectly timeds report, thesis, whatever you want to call it, on uh Bitcoin outperforming US equities. I think what makes this a little different like this decoupling from the last one where it it lasted for like maybe a day is in that time the the S&P and US equities were were dumping pretty significantly and Bitcoin was just kind of staying stagnant or not dropping as much whereas now today I look at the charts and the S&P is down over 2 and a half% and Bitcoin's up over 2 and a

half%. So to me, this is a pretty meaningful swing uh in this direction. I think it comes from specifically Trump's comments um or I guess his truth social post where I guess the gist or the TLDDR is uh US dollar down. Uh and so people are basically uh buying gold hand over fist as if they already weren't doing that. Uh and then Bitcoin I guess is sort of coupled within this trade. Um, so that's what I'm seeing at least.

I default to Felix for all macro takes. I've been so tuned into cryp I say this every podcast, but I've just been so plugged into uh crypto over the last three-ish years that I got I got no meaningful laring to do. I would say that the um as someone who used to do macro no longer does, um it's definitely interesting. You've had now two days where Bitcoin goes up when markets go down. And I think that that's pretty interesting. um for a lot of my career um if you could look at prices today and how they were behaving and really understand what was happening tomorrow um with with a with a reasonable degree of certainty. I think that the problem

with what Bitcoin is trying to achieve rather than just like what you know changing beta between sectors and countries and you know instruments and asset classes um is that Bitcoin is trying to or at least the proponents of it want it to be this like riskoff asset when has when it has historically been anything but there is a huge behavior change that needs to happen for that to succeed. Um, it would be the most profound shift that I'm aware of in markets. It like, you know, we've all seen this shift in markets where the long bonds stopped working in riskoff environments and it's like kind of not worked. I mean, it's definitely

not worked, but the degree it's like, okay, it's like it's off a little. 6040 is kind of broken. Um, you would really need a change in buyer behavior. um you know from an asset that used to go down 70% in recessions to an asset that goes up in recessions is a is a is a huge ask. So I think while it's potentially promising I think you know it's still like you know show me it's still you know Bitcoin has to has to prove that out. Yeah, I think that's fair. And I think there's a timing thing at at play here, right? You know, even looking back a few weeks, it's people start getting out the decoupling posts and then a few days later, you know, I think maybe there's some lag effect to that price action relative to the rest of the market. Um,

and we see this in other ways with with Bitcoin and crypto relative to other markets where moves happen on the weekends or like off hours and then, you know, the the week comes into play and then, you know, you see another move or like a a more concentrated move or, you know, something to rebalance the the activity that was occurring on the weekend, whatever it may be. So, um, to Ryan's point, I guess at least, I think we we'll need more time to see like a verification of this idea if it's if it's really decoupling or happening at all. And and you have to see it's important when hits the fan like that's those are the moments where you need the thing to work for you. You know I think I think long bonds if hits the fan if you start seeing like runs on

banks and financial institutions rolling over then you you probably although long bonds haven't worked like you'll start to see them work in that way because that'll be a very deflationary force. I mean, you got to think all the counterparty risk that is existent in Bitcoin um and all that leverage in that system. Like I really doubt that Bitcoin becomes this riskoff asset when when you go through a March of 2020 or a you know 2008 or something like that. We'll have to see. Hopefully we don't have to go through a a March of 2020 again anytime soon. But you never know with the way Trump and and associates have been acting and the way the markets have been

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