Crypto prices again muted as gold surges to new record, U.S. stocks advance

• Crypto prices are slipping a little during the U.S. trading session as precious metals and stocks move higher.
• The AI trade remains strong, with bitcoin miners who have pivoted business models moving sharply higher.
• Both gold and silver hit new records Monday and one analyst said bitcoin can't rally until those metals cool.

Crypto bulls are again watching from the sidelines as the debasement trade continues and risk assets generally move broadly higher during the U.S. trading session.

The standout performer on Monday is gold, which has surged 2% to a new record high of $4,475 per ounce. Silver is higher by 1.6% and earlier hit its own fresh record at just below $70 per ounce.

Just after the noon hour on the east coast, the Nasdaq and S&P 500 are each ahead by 0.6% and the U.S. dollar index is lower by 0.3%.

After racing above $90,000 during the Asian/European trading sessions, bitcoin BTC$87,563.81 has pulled back closer to $89,000, still ahead over the past 24 hours, but continuing to underperform most major asset classes.

Ether ETH$2,965.93, solana SOL$124.34 and XRP$1.8928 also in the green on Monday, but they too have pulled back from highs hit prior to the U.S. opening for trade.

AI trade remains strong

A check of crypto-related stocks shows those bitcoin miners that have pivoted to business models to a focus on AI infrastructure and high-performance computing strongly outperforming on Monday.

Helping the mood in that sector was a deal for Alphabet (GOOG) to acquire AI infrastructure start-up Intersect for $4.75 billion. "The acquisition," said Alphabet, "will enable more data center and generation capacity to come online, faster, while accelerating energy development and innovation."

Hut 8 (HUT) is leading gainers with an advance of 17.5%. IREN (IREN), Cipher Mining (CIFR) and Bitfarms (BITF) are posting gains of 5%-10%.

In other crypto sectors, Circle (CRCL), Coinbase (COIN), Bullish (BLSH) and Galaxy Digital (GLXY) are ahead 2%-4%, and bitcoin treasury bellwether Strategy (MSTR) is up just 0.3%.

Bitcoin may not rally until gold cools

"I reiterate the point that bitcoin and crypto are unlikely to shine until this bull market in precious metals comes to a pause," ByteTree analysts, led by Charlie Morris and Shehriyar Ali, said in a Monday report.

They pointed out that despite the current trends bitcoin have outperformed the metals sector over the past few years.

However, silver with its ongoing parabolic rally has now nearly matched BTC's return over the past eight years.

Read more: Why Gold Is Winning Over Bitcoin in 2025: Liquidity, Trade, and Trust

2025 was defined by a stark divergence: structural progress collided with stagnant price action. Institutional milestones were reached and TVL increased across most major ecosystems, yet the majority of large-cap Layer-1 tokens finished the year with negative or flat returns.

This report analyzes the structural decoupling between network usage and token performance. We examine 10 major blockchain ecosystems, exploring protocol versus application revenues, key ecosystem narratives, mechanics driving institutional adoption, and the trends to watch as we head into 2026.

• VanEck data shows that in the past 30 days bitcoin’s hashrate dropped by the most since April 2024
• Hashrate declines are historically aligned with miner capitulation and markets closer to local bottoms than tops.
• According to VanEck, periods of negative 90-day hashrate growth have delivered positive 180-day bitcoin returns 77% of the time.

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