Performance analysis of the past month shows that cryptocurrency companies have outperformed artificial intelligence (AI) and semiconductor companies by a considerable margin.
Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN), America’s largest crypto exchange, saw its stock rise by 14.85% in the past month. Meanwhile, Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA), the lead company designing AI hardware and software, saw its stock lose 0.29% over the same period.
Source: TradingView
Another benchmark comparison is between AI company Palantir Technologies (NYSE: PLTR) and Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR), the world’s largest publicly traded Bitcoin treasury. Strategy stock gained 10.62% in the past month, while Palantir’s fell 1.75%.
Why Crypto outpaced AI
There are three main reasons why crypto beat AI in the first month, with the first being the capex (capital expenditure) panic. Investors grew concerned that their massive spending to develop AI wasn’t reflected in the companies’ immediate returns.
Secondly, breakthroughs in foreign AI and semiconductor companies threatened Western monopoly. One Chinese-based firm recently engineered chip manufacturing machines which were previously only available via Dutch giant ASML. The US has restricted exports of the company’s best systems to China for competitive purposes, but the recent development might just have leveled that playing field.
Even more, Chinese AI models such as Moonshot’s KIMI K3 heavily excel in coding, math, and structured tasks. This cuts monopoly and tightens the race between nations to dominate in AI. It also impacts investor confidence, just as in AI chips.
As a result, AI stocks experienced massive sell-offs as capital pivoted into digital assets. In that month, flagship cryptocurrency Bitcoin gained 7.82%, while the overall market cap grew from $2.05 trillion to $2.19 trillion.
The outliers
In the past year, Bitcoin miners have been largely shifting into AI hosting as mining profits dwindled. However, their shares have underperformed due to concerns over the high power costs, lengthy build-out timelines, and heavy debt loads. In the past month, Core Scientific (NASDAQ: CORZ) and Cipher Mining (NASDAQ: CIFR) stocks declined by 12.51% and 10.60%, respectively.
Source: TradingView
Nonetheless, both AI and crypto are facing individual “make-or-break” dynamics. For crypto, it is mainly legitimization via regulation, while for AI, it is suffering a similar fate to the 1999 Dot-Com bubble.