The case for crypto is modest – the way it's sold isn’t

On my commute through London I see more ads for cryptocurrency platforms than for most traditional asset managers. Between stations, promotions for trading apps and token exchanges are everywhere, in some cases showing cross-armed footballers on a background of financial charts going up.

Last August, crypto trading platform Bitpanda announced a multi-year partnership with Arsenal FC, becoming the club's official crypto trading partner – one of several such deals struck between crypto platforms and Premier League clubs in recent years.

The billboards are up across the London tube network alongside stated ambitions to help supporters “invest in crypto securely and confidently”.

There is no denying that cryptocurrency – and in particular Bitcoin – has been hugely popular for several years and has recently been on a journey that would have seemed unlikely in 2020: from speculative curiosity to institutional portfolio item.

Bitcoin exchange-traded products (ETPs) account for roughly 7% of total Bitcoin supply, public companies hold another 5% and governments a further 3%, according to WisdomTree data from January 2026 – meaning nearly a fifth of all Bitcoin in existence sits in institutional or quasi-institutional hands.

When investors lost confidence in the dollar earlier this year – sending gold to record highs as they sought assets outside the system – Bitcoin found itself discussed in the same way, as a non-sovereign store of value with a fixed supply.

And studies show it may not be a far-fetched theory. WisdomTree research last year found that a 1% Bitcoin allocation added to a standard 60/40 portfolio would have improved the Sharpe ratio from 0.52 to 0.59 over the decade to end-2025, with each incremental increase improving it further.

Small bitcoin allocations have historically improved portfolio risk/return metrics

Source: Bloomberg, WisdomTree. From 31 December 2013 to 31 December 2025. Based on daily USD returns. The 60/40 Global Portfolio is composed of 60% MSCI All Country World and 40% Bloomberg Multiverse.

Françoise Collet, CIO of Europe at DNCA, said: “I think it is a valid argument that Bitcoin could be digital gold,” adding that “it can make sense to have a small allocation.”

Most people, however, do not encounter crypto through a thorough research process but through advertising, social media and, seemingly, the TfL network.

Herein lies the problem.

While I would wager most professional investors view cryptocurrency as a very high-risk bet, it falls into a theme of getting rich quickly that has seemingly grown in prevalence over recent years.

Paul Wood, of investment manager Woodhill, wrote about what he called financial nihilism: a shift in investor psychology, accelerated during Covid, in which fundamentals are viewed as largely irrelevant.

“Over time, this idea that an investment is only worth considering if it can deliver a 10-fold return has spread more widely across markets,” he wrote.

But cryptocurrency is far from a sure thing. Since the end of UK lockdowns in early 2022, Ether is down around 30%, Cardano has lost 70% and Trump coin is off more than 90% from its initial surge. Bitcoin has held up better but has been incredibly volatile. In the past six months, the most common cryptocurrency has almost halved from its $122,000 peak in October 2025 to around $69,000 today.

For an asset class that risks losing investors a lot of money, its marketing is everywhere and hard to ignore. But, for many, this is likely exactly what they should do.