A panel moderated by Antonio De Negri of Otala.markets shed light on the evolving perception and regulation of cryptocurrencies, highlighting the increased legitimacy of Bitcoin and Ethereum.

There has been a convergence pattern occurring between Bitcoin and gold as their correlation drops to a three-year low this month. “[The two] married together is quite an interesting proposal,” said Jigna Gibb, head of commodities and crypto index products at Bloomberg Indexes.

We’re generally seeing more and more acceptance and legitimization of digital assets - Jigna Gibb, Bloomberg Indexes

Thirty-day volatility in gold climbed above 44%, the highest level since the 2008 financial crisis. That surpassed the roughly 39% for Bitcoin, Bloomberg data showed in early February.

The former investment banker pointed to Bitcoin’s resilience following the April 2025 “Liberation Day” tariff announcements, noting its strong rebound after the initial shock.

Bitcoin tends to be neutral against traditional assets, but the role in correlation, for example with tech stocks and software companies, has emerged to be quite high, said Gibb.

“We’re generally seeing more and more acceptance and legitimization of digital assets,” she said, pointing to the US regulator’s greenlight to cryptocurrency-linked exchange-traded funds (ETFs) being the primary driver.

Left to right: Antonio De Negri (moderator), Otala.markets; Patrick Scholl, Mayer Brown; and Jigna Gibb, Bloomberg Indexes

Global digital assets under management (AuM) in exchange-traded products (ETPs) have reached shy of US$300 billion as the AuM of gold ETFs exceeded US$600 billion at a record level, according to Gibb citing Bloomberg data.

We have still a dividing view within regulators in Europe when it comes to crypto assets - Patrick Scholl, Mayer Brown

“[It is] not quite the popularity that we’re getting with the more mainstream asset, but we are definitely seeing more interest [in digital assets],” she said.

However, the flows from both types of ETFs are “quite fickle” in view of the billions of dollars outflow for iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT) since November. “So that’s also showing that even though there has been acceptance of digital assets more broadly, being packaged in wrappers that are more familiar. There isn’t really a long-term buy and hold,” said Gibb.

But that gives advantage at the same time as investors might be looking at more short-term signals like momentum and trend through ETFs.

Gibb has observed increasing activity for index-based and spot-based investments in digital assets with leverage or inverse ETFs being actively traded in the US.

“I think we’ll see more activity coming along the lines of the delta growing, [which is] quite actively traded, but also more of the options, volatility-based payouts evolving. We’ll see more of those payouts, then emerging into structured products,” said Gibb.

Left to right: Antonio De Negri (moderator), Otala.markets; Patrick Scholl, Mayer Brown; and Jigna Gibb, Bloomberg Indexes

On the legal side, Patrick Scholl (pictured), a partner at Mayer Brown, highlighted the additional layer of technical risk specific to digital assets, alongside the mis-selling issues that often lie at the heart of disputes involving structured products.

That new risk may stem from forms of cybercrime with which many investors are unfamiliar, particularly theft targeting both exchanges and individual wallets.

“We have still a dividing view within regulators in Europe when it comes to crypto assets,” said Scholl.

Some financial authorities typically perceived as more liberal have taken a restrictive stance on the use of cryptocurrencies, while others regarded as more conservative have opted to cautiously embrace them, such as Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin), according to the Frankfurt-based lawyer.

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