As reported by libertarian financial blog Zero Hedge, the investment bank’s managing director of credit strategy, Jim Reid, has taken note of the alpha currency’s latest movements.

He remarked,

“Bitcoin is up another +3% overnight and seems to be creating momentum of its own. It’s up over 70% over the last six weeks as more and more investors are starting to see it emerge as a credible asset to invest in.”

To take the point further, Reid said, “one of the oddities has been the dramatic divergence between Gold (-3.6%) and Silver (-4.4%) on the one hand and Bitcoin (+13.4%) on the other.”

And that “there also seems to be an increasing demand to use Bitcoin where Gold used to be used to hedge Dollar risk, inflation, and other things.”

Bitcoin has long been touted as a new, better form of (digital) gold due to its capped supply and ability to store value outside of the traditional financial ecosystem.

While bitcoin is up close to 150% this year, gold has gained just above 20%. The commonality is that the inflation-boosting monetary and fiscal policies introduced in response to the Coronavirus seem to be fueling both assets.

Since the pandemic hit, central banks have tried to soften the blow by easing policy, starting programs to pump liquidity into economies worldwide.

Given such conditions, many investors are seeking inflation hedge assets, and if Reid’s comments are any indicator, they increasingly favor Bitcoin. As of this writing, the price of bitcoin is $17,697, while gold sits at $1,863 per oz.