Diamonds on my (block)chain... Bitcoin topped $40K for the first time last week, more than doubling in a month. The epic rally was partly driven by institutional FOMO: companies like banks and hedge funds have been pouring into the crypto coin. Mainstream investors, who have more access to bitcoin than ever through fintech apps, also took part in the rally. While bitcoin tends to be volatile (read: crash-prone), some see it as a hedge against inflation: bitcoin's supply is capped at 21M coins, while the Fed’s money printers have been blasting out $$$ to stimulate the economy.
Clean juice cleanse... Electric vehicles had a moment last week with a flurry of milestones. Nio, the so-called "Tesla of China," said its 2020 deliveries more than doubled from a year ago to ~44K. Tesla (the "Tesla of Tesla") delivered a record-breaking ~500K cars last year. Meanwhile in Norway, electric cars outsold gas and hybrid models for the first time in 2020. In the UK, EV sales nearly tripled while total auto sales hit the lowest level since 1992.