Bitcoin Outpaces Gold and Oil Amid Early Days of US–Iran Conflict - Crypto Economy

TL;DR:

• Bitcoin rose 12.1% since the U.S. and Israel launched airstrikes against Iran on February 28, outperforming gold and oil.
• Crude oil climbed 10.4% amid the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, while gold fell 3% and silver posted losses of 10.2%.
• A study with 9,072 experiments across 36 AI models found that agents choose Bitcoin 48% of the time as the optimal monetary asset.

Four days after the start of the American and Israeli airstrikes against Iran, Bitcoin proved to be the best-performing asset among the major global investment classes.

Since Donald Trump authorized Operation Epic Fury at 1:15 a.m. on February 28, New York time, Bitcoin climbed 12.1%, rising from $65,492 to $73,231 at the time of writing The S&P 500 barely moved, with a change of just -0.1%, while Nvidia posted a modest recovery of 2.8%, a figure that still fell short of matching the performance of the world’s largest cryptocurrency.

Gold, historically considered the ultimate safe haven in wartime contexts, posted a 3% decline after an initial peak it could not sustain Silver fully erased its brief initial rally and accumulated losses of 10.2%. The appreciation of the dollar and the shift of geopolitical fear toward inflation expectations partly explained the reversal in precious metals.

The Strait of Hormuz and the Logic of the Barrel

Crude oil climbed 10.4%, driven by the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic corridor through which approximately one fifth of the world’s daily supply flows Tanker traffic in the area fell by around 81% since the conflict began, after insurers withdrew war risk coverage Freight rates in the area reached historic highs. Brent touched $82 per barrel at its initial peak, and analysts at Barclays warned that the price could reach $100 if the blockade holds. OPEC+ announced an additional output of 206,000 barrels per day to cushion the impact, though the effect was only partial.

Bitcoin as a Crisis Asset

Beyond the wartime context, a recent study provided an additional perspective on Bitcoin’s role in the global financial ecosystem. Researchers published the results of 9,072 experiments conducted across 36 frontier artificial intelligence models AI agents chose Bitcoin 48% of the time when selecting an optimal monetary asset In store-of-value scenarios specifically, 79% opted for Bitcoin. Claude Opus 4.5, by Anthropic, one of the most widely used models in the world, chose it in 91% of cases.

It is worth noting that, in terms of year-to-date accumulation, the picture is different: BTC is down 16%, while gold rose 18% over the same period.