Bitcoin a ‘Potential Store of Value’ That’s Very Volatile: Fidelity Digital Assets Head

Investors are hoping bitcoin becomes a “store of value” but the largest cryptocurrency is still very volatile, Tom Jessop, head of Fidelity Digital Assets (FDAS), said during the Reuters Global Investment Outlook Summit 2020 on Thursday. 

“We use the words ‘potential store of value’ as bitcoin is still extremely volatile, and by any standard perhaps would not achieve the mantle of a true store of value,” said Jessop, whose company, a unit of Fidelity Investments, offers cryptocurrency trading and custody services for financial firms and corporations. His remarks were reported by Reuters. 

Jessop added that while bitcoin’s volatility prevents it from acting as a reliable way to store value, “aspirationally” it could be one, and “that’s one of the reasons why so many investors are now thinking about this space constructively.”

Currently, low trading volumes seem to have kept bitcoin hovering around $19,000 after touching its all-time high of $19,850 last week.

While sharp price movements in a market can often scare investors because volatility gets conflated with risk, what’s unique about bitcoin’s volatility is that unlike the volatility index (VIX) for the S&P 500, bitcoin’s VIX  tends to be positively correlated with the asset’s price. 

In an October report regarding bitcoin’s market cap, FDAS noted that due to bitcoin’s uncorrelated nature the crypto’s market cap has ample space to grow. 

“In a world where benchmark interest rates globally are near, at or below zero, the opportunity cost of not allocating to bitcoin is higher,” the report noted.