Fifteen years after 'Pizza Day,' Bitcoin reached new all-time highs at $111,980. The crypto world remembers how on May 22, 2010, a Florida programmer named Laszlo Hanyecz paid 10,000 bitcoins for two pizzas from Papa John's; $42 at the exchange rate at that time. Today, the value of that transaction would amount to over $1.1 billion.
Bitcoin continues its path aided by the uncertainty generated in the markets by the Trump Administration, despite initially not acting as a safe-haven asset. It has risen 16% against the dollar this year, three times more than the appreciation in euros, amid investors fleeing dollar-denominated assets. Decisions made by the Donald Trump administration have led to Bitcoin ETFs receiving $9 billion in capital inflows over the last five weeks, led by BlackRock, the largest fund of them all.
Out of those billions, a third has been concentrated in this week when Bitcoin spot ETFs - those approved by the Federal Reserve in January 2024, sparking euphoria - gathered $2.75 billion in net inflows, with nearly $930 million entering on Thursday, the day the digital currency hit its highs, "the eighth-highest daily figure since the launch of these products," a year and a half ago, according to data compiled by Simon Peters, a crypto asset analyst at eToro.
Meanwhile, gold has seen outflows of around $3 billion since mid-April, despite rising 26% in 2025, mainly following the Liberation day on April 2, when Trump announced new tariffs on 75 other countries. It hit highs above $3,400 at the end of April, record after record, and has since dropped by 3%.
"In 2022, when the negative correlation between bond yields and stock performance broke, many investors sought new sources of diversification, turning to gold or bitcoin and moving away from bonds to hedge their portfolios," recalls Brij Khurana, a portfolio manager at Wellington Management, who is reminded of that time. The expert believes that something similar is happening now, with investors looking to diversify their portfolios away from the US stock market either "towards their home markets or other assets" like cryptocurrencies, although in reality, Bitcoin is cannibalizing the entire crypto universe.
In the past year alone, Bitcoin's market capitalization has grown over 60% while Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency in the world, has decreased by 25%. In this conquest of highs, the major crypto has surpassed a $2.1 trillion market value, while Ethereum's market cap has fallen below $330 billion, and the third most relevant currency is trying to stay above $150 billion. In fact, according to data from the European Central Bank (ECB) until May, Bitcoin's market share has increased from 40% in 2022 to 60% in May 2025.
Beyond Bitcoin enthusiasts, the volatility unleashed by the Trump Administration between March and April made many reconsider the role of this crypto asset as a store of value. It wasn't acting as one. In fact, although in Europe the famous 'Liberation Day' is thought to be the most relevant, Canada and Mexico had already felt the consequences of Donald Trump's venomous tongue a month earlier. On March 3, the US president announced a 25% blanket tariff on all imports from these two countries to its borders. This move also did not materialize as he postponed his decision three days later. Well, from March 3 to 11, Bitcoin plummeted nearly 15% to $79,500 at the exchange rate. And a month later, it repeated the same pattern. Investors fled the digital currency, which almost dropped below $75,000 on April 9, the day Donald Trump announced a 90-day tariff pause. That session on Wall Street saw a historic rebound, with a 9.5% surge for the S&P 500, the largest increase in 17 years, and a 12% rise for the Nasdaq 100, unseen since the dot-com bubble in 2001. Since those lows, Bitcoin has surged 45%. During that time, Moody's downgraded the US debt rating from the top triple-A grade to one notch below, due to a growing deficit (over 7%) and Trump's fiscal plan, which experts believe will increase public debt.
The Trump family has shown clear support for cryptocurrencies, whether memes or not (just like the president's close friend, Elon Musk). This week, the holding company of Truth, the social network owned by the US president, announced to the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) its intention to acquire $2.5 billion in bitcoins. To do so, the Trump Media & Technology Group will issue shares and convertible bonds (CoCos, in financial jargon) through which it aims to raise $1.5 billion and $1 billion from shareholders and bondholders, respectively, to buy around 23,000 bitcoins at current market prices.
This would make TMTG one of the largest holders or whales, as known in the crypto world, of this digital currency. Currently, according to data compiled by Bloomberg news agency, there are around 30 US companies holding Bitcoin as part of their treasury.
'Another cryptoboom? Watch out for blind spots,' is the title of the latest report published by the European Central Bank (ECB) analyzing the risks of widespread Bitcoin ownership among European households and banks.
Aware that the crypto world is increasingly piquing citizens' interest, the ECB has not overlooked the risks posed by families holding digital currencies. The regulator is concerned about the extremely high volatility of these financial assets, but above all, the impact a market crash could cause. "Depending on how that exposure to cryptos is financed [often investors leverage or borrow to buy bitcoins] and the illiquidity of their investments, losses could be amplified with a potential impact on the financial system and the real economy," the report states.
The growing interest in Bitcoin is closely related to the launch of spot Bitcoin ETFs, which "accumulate $125 billion in assets under management" as of May, according to the organization. Interest has also increased in the futures market at the Chicago Board Options Exchange, where cryptocurrencies have been trading for several quinquenniums.
But does the European citizen know what they are getting into? Perhaps yes, and perhaps an unimaginable world of profits doesn't matter at this moment, but Bitcoin's volatility was estimated to be twice that of gold last year and up to three times that of the S&P 500, the benchmark index on the New York Stock Exchange. And this last data is very relevant because historically, Bitcoin's behavior has been highly correlated with the stock market, mainly with technology (Nasdaq), implying that the return on a stock portfolio vs. a cryptocurrency one has not been significantly different, and yet, to reach the same place, the investor has gone through a nerve-wracking journey.
Another concern is the concentration of bitcoins in the hands of whales. Considering that miners will increasingly receive fewer coins for their work, as the number is limited to 21 million and there are already 19.6 in circulation, the ECB is worried that crypto assets will be concentrated in a few holders and become more vulnerable to cyberattacks, potentially destabilizing the system.
Currently, the ownership of crypto assets by European households is limited. According to the central bank, 1 in 10 Europeans invest in cryptocurrencies, although the figure is very small: half of them have less than 1,000 euros, and 91% of those surveyed have less than 20,000 euros. "This suggests that European families hold at least 75 billion euros in crypto assets, representing 0.23% of financial wealth and 3% of the crypto market capitalization," the report notes.
Another fear of the ECB is the increased exposure of banks to cryptocurrencies, which is still very marginal. Directly, entities only had 1 million euros in cryptos on their balance sheets and another 600 million in derivatives. However, indirectly, their exposure is much higher. They provide custody services for assets valued at 4.7 billion euros, nearly 12 times more than the figures in 2023. On the other hand, less than 10 European banks hold significant deposits from major crypto platforms, which serve as a source of liquidity. These deposits have decreased and were halved by the end of 2024, totaling 1.2 billion euros.