Bitcoin and gold are 2026's worst-performing assets

Bitcoin and gold are supposed to be opposites. Bitcoin is the risky bet. Gold is the safe one investors run to when markets get scary. In 2026, both are losing. Bitcoin is down 7.3% this year. Gold is down 7.5%. According to Charlie Bilello, a strategist at Creative Planning, that's never happened in the same calendar year before.

Normally when stocks fall, gold rises, because scared money runs somewhere. Bitcoin was supposed to work the same way, as "digital gold." Neither is working as a safety net right now. Both lost money as investors pulled back from risk broadly, not just from crypto or tech stocks. That's the real story: traditional safe havens are only safe until everyone needs them to be.

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Will investors go back to trusting gold and Bitcoin as safety nets once this rough patch ends? Bitcoin rose 121% in 2024. Gold rose nearly 64% in 2025. Both have topped the charts before, so a comeback isn't out of the question. But this year is a reminder that no asset is safe in every kind of downturn. Not even the ones built on that exact promise.