Bitcoin (BTC-USD) recaptured investor attention on Monday as the world’s biggest cryptocurrency surged beyond $106,000 to a new record.
The token has gained more than 50% since Donald Trump’s presidential victory in November on optimism over bitcoin-friendly policies under his incoming administration.
Much of the upward price action stems from institutional buyers and flows into bitcoin spot exchange traded funds (ETFS).
“Bitcoin ETF demand has been relentless with over $2Bn inflows clocked last week. Seven out of the last nine weeks, Bitcoin ETF inflows have exceeded $2Bn,” wrote Bernstein analysts on Monday.
Even as bitcoin’s price has more than doubled this year, some Wall Street analysts forecast about another 100% gain by the end of 2025.
UK-based Standard Chartered analysts recently noted institutions have bought 683,000 tokens year-to-date via spot ETFs and purchases by software firm MicroStrategy (MSTR).
About a third of those inflows, or the purchase of 245,000 bitcoins, have occurred since the presidential election.
“In 2025, we expect institutional flows to continue at or above the 2024 pace,” wrote Geoff Kendrick, global head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered, earlier this month.
Crypto-related stocks also surged on Monday with bitcoin proxy MicroStrategy (MSTR) popping 4% ahead of its inclusion in the Nasdaq 100 (^NDX) on December 23.
Bitcoin’s meteoric rise over the past month has made the asset hard to ignore even among more traditional portfolio managers.
“It’s worked like crazy and it’ll probably continue to work like crazy but I can’t put my pencil to the paper and make sense of it from a financial standpoint,” George Seay, Annandale Capital founder and chairman told Yahoo Finance on Monday morning.
“It’s much more of a psychological anti-fiat currency, anti-government, anti-inflation trade, but it’s worked so I don’t have anything against it,” he added.
Ines Ferre is a senior business reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on X at @ines_ferre.
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