Within the last 60 minutes, Bitcoin's market capitalization pushed above the $1 trillion level. This milestone occurred less than a year after its market cap dipped below $100 billion on Black Thursday and the move to a new best high took place correct as BTC toll is on the verge of overtaking $55,000.

Bitcoin market cap in USD. Source: TradingView

The significance of this effect will not exist lost of those working in financial every bit merely a handful of assets ever reach this status. While Bitcoin may have started every bit a mere curiosity in 2009, it simply took information technology 12 years to become a global nugget with a $1 trillion market capitalization.

For those unfamiliar with Bitcoin's unique toll history, x,000 BTC were auctioned at the Bitcointalk.org forum in March 2010 for $50, simply no buyer was constitute.

Ii months later, Laszlo Hanyecz bought 2 pizzas for 10,000 BTC, and the rest is history. Thus, during its first xvi months of existence, Bitcoin was something between a collectible with no monetary value and an experiment among enthusiasts.

Gilt and silver accept a much longer history

Largest global assets' ranking by market capitalization. Source: 8marketcap.com

According to 8marketcap, besides Bitcoin, there are only seven tradable assets with a market capitalization surpassing $ane trillion. Naturally, gold and argent are on this list as they are synonyms of money and take served equally a store of value for over 4,000 years.

Although extinct from coinage and reserve requirements to back fiat currency, golden remains widely used by central banks, common funds, and retail investors. While precious metals accept the advantage of having a relatively constant supply, many visitor's abilities to generate profits are evolving.

Amazon, for case, was founded in July 1994 every bit an online marketplace for books. Today, the behemothic conglomerate profits from cloud computing, digital streaming, flick and television productions, gadgets, supermarkets, e-commerce and artificial intelligence.

In June 1996, Amazon raised $8 one thousand thousand in seed coin from Kleiner Perkins and in that aforementioned twelvemonth the company had lost $v.8 million even though its quaternary-quarter acquirement doubled from the previous one. Amazon'southward IPO in May 1997 had an initial $12-to-$14 pricing range but settling at $18, which valued the company at $438 meg.

It took Amazon 27 years to accomplish a $one trillion market capitalization took 27 years. Meanwhile, Microsoft, which was founded in Apr 1975, crossed the $i trillion milestone 45 years afterwards (June 2019). Google launched in September 1998, and 22 years later on (Jan 2020) the visitor crossed the $1 trillion mark.

Will Bitcoin overtake aureate adjacent?

Aureate's market capitalization crossed $1 trillion in 1972 co-ordinate to inflation-adjusted numbers. That price would be equivalent to $450 per ounce, breaking a downtrend that was initiated in 1939 past Earth War II.

Earlier speculating on whether BTC will overtake aureate's market cap and its status as a global shop of value, it's important to consider that valuing a multi-faceted engineering science nugget such equally Bitcoin is a rather unfair comparison with traditional investments.

BTC is a digital shop of value that simultaneously functions equally a peer-to-peer payment network. Moreover, its censorship-resistant characteristics tin't be mimicked by third-party dependent assets.

Lastly, different aureate, Bitcoin is a protocol and a programmable shared database. If somehow breakthrough computing becomes capable of breaking SHA-256 cryptography, the network can auto-arrange a solution, fifty-fifty if it is a temporary ane.

In August 2010, 92 billion BTC were mined after an overflow error was exploited. The solution involved the entire network agreeing on a rollover, which proved that the ultimate security consensus lies in its user base.

How would aureate enthusiasts react if asteroid mining becomes a reality? What if an extremely 'accurate' and expensive faux gold supply entered the market place, causing mass testing to get a necessity for every trade? These are issues Bitcoin investors will never take to worry virtually.

Moreover, companies run risks of frauds, sizable follow-on offers, liabilities, and potential regulatory changes. Meanwhile, decentralized protocols are nigh free of those perils, thus justifying a much higher valuation in Bitcoin's case.

Bitcoin'southward path to condign a multi-trillion dollar asset seems to have a much easier route than gold, silverish, or tech stocks. For instance, the world'south real estate marketplace is estimated to exist worth northward $280 trillion, according to information from Visual Backer.

How much of the real estate and debt (bonds) market place could shift to Bitcoin remains an open question.

The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the autho r and practise non necessarily reverberate the views of Cointelegraph. Every investment and trading move involves risk. You should conduct your ain inquiry when making a conclusion.