2025: The year gold stole the spotlight while crypto struggled 🟨

Gold's rally was hard to ignore. The precious metal wrapped up the year with an impressive 62.6% gain, powered by aggressive central bank buying and ongoing tariff-driven uncertainty. Just in Q4 alone, it surged 11.4%—a powerful finale to a dominant year.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin's story told a different tale. $BTC posted a 6.4% loss for the year, managing only to edge out the U.S. dollar index and crude oil among major asset classes. For a digital asset class built on disruption, underperforming traditional commodities raised some eyebrows in the crypto community.

The contrast highlights how macroeconomic headwinds—central bank policy shifts and trade tensions—shaped asset flows in ways that favored hard assets over risk exposure. Both assets play different roles in a portfolio, but 2025 was undeniably gold's championship year.