Despite record high, S&P 500 is down in Bitcoin terms

The S&P 500 Index has staged a remarkable turnaround since April, but its performance still lags considerably behind BTC.

The US stock market’s V-shaped recovery since April has driven the S&P 500 Index to record highs — yet measured in Bitcoin, the benchmark is still down significantly this year, underscoring the digital asset’s strong outperformance.

On Thursday, the S&P 500 Index closed at a record high of 6,280.46, extending its year-to-date gain to 7%. However, when measured in Bitcoin (BTC), the large-cap index is down 15% so far in 2025, according to market commentator The Kobeissi Letter.

Citing data from Bitbo, The Kobeissi Letter also pointed out that the S&P 500 has dropped a staggering 99.98% against Bitcoin since 2012.

Bitcoin’s price surged to a new all-time high on Friday, briefly topping $118,800 on Coinbase, according to Cointelegraph Markets Pro. BTC has gained 5.5% in the past 24 hours, 9% over the last week and is up 24% so far this year.

Although Bitcoin has dramatically outperformed the benchmark stock index since its inception, its performance against major tech stocks like Nvidia (NVDA), Tesla (TSLA) and Netflix (NFLX) has been equally remarkable.

Analyst Charlie Bilello highlighted Bitcoin’s meteoric rise over the past decade compared to these and other assets, underscoring BTC’s standout outperformance.

From stocks to Bitcoin: ETF investors pile into BTC in 2025

Bitcoin’s record rally this year has been fueled in part by growing institutional demand, with investors pouring money into BTC spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) alongside traditional equity funds.

As of Friday, the 12 US spot Bitcoin ETFs held a combined 1,264,976 BTC worth $148.6 billion, according to Bitbo data, representing over 6% of Bitcoin’s total supply.

In the first half of 2025, strong demand for Bitcoin helped push digital asset ETFs to the third-largest fund category by inflows, behind only short-term government debt and gold, according to State Street data.