The situation in Russia and Ukraine is getting increasingly tense! Investors turn to gold and bonds, ditch cryptocurrencies and stocks

Cryptocurrencies fell across the board as investors turned to traditional investments such as gold and bonds as tensions between Russia and Ukraine grew.

More than $65 billion has been wiped off the global cryptocurrency market cap in the past 24 hours, with bitcoin and ethereum both falling on Monday. Bitcoin fell 0.8% to around $42,000, while Ethereum fell 2.2% to $2,877. Compared to Bitcoin, Ethereum is down about 7% over the past seven days, and Bitcoin is down 1.1%.

U.S. stock futures fell, while in Europe, 98% of stocks in the Stoxx 600 were down. The latest news shows that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had been informed that February 16 would be the date of the Russian attack. Investors are flocking to gold and the Swiss franc as safe bets amid ongoing uncertainty.

This is happening despite cryptocurrency proponents claiming that Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are a safe store of value. As MicroStrategy (MSTR.US) CEO Michael Saylor pointed out last week, if investors aren't ready to play 10 years of bitcoin, they shouldn't hold bitcoin for more than 10 minutes.

GlobalBlock analyst Marcus Sotiriou noted that risk assets such as cryptocurrencies and tech stocks are suffering due to the uncertainty of the war. Adding to the tension, President Biden warned he would shut down the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that transports Russian gas to Germany if Russia invaded Ukraine.

Sotiriou said: “This pipeline supplies a large portion of the gas to Europe, so if it were to be shut down, that could cause oil prices to climb, making inflation a bigger problem. High inflation is the reason the Fed is raising rates and is There is the potential to lead us into a recession as aggressive monetary policy leads to slower growth.”

Crude oil prices rose to nearly $100 a barrel on Monday, while European natural gas prices surged 5%, adding to long-standing concerns about consumer inflation.

Some cryptocurrency analysts have expressed greater concerns about the overall market in 2022, claiming that it could be a bearish year. In an interview with Stansberry Research, investment strategist Lyn Alden said she was not bullish on bitcoin this year because it tends to underperform after major bull markets, although she noted that there aren’t that many historical records to repeat.

She explained: “Historically, Bitcoin has only experienced about four major bull markets: 2011, 2013, 2017, and 2020, all of which occurred in an environment of rising PMIs, which is an accelerating economy. . So generally speaking, historically, this stage is not an investment in Bitcoin.”