Why Gold and Silver Keep Losing to Bitcoin: The Supply Story Nobody Talks About

When gold hit a fresh all-time high of $4,533 per ounce in 2025 and silver surged to nearly $80 per ounce, you’d think precious metals advocates would be celebrating. But here’s the uncomfortable truth: even as these commodities reach record prices, they still drastically underperform Bitcoin by an astronomical margin.

The numbers tell the story. Since 2015, Bitcoin has delivered a staggering 27,701% return. Compare that to silver’s 405% gain or gold’s 283% appreciation over the same decade-plus period. We’re talking about performance that’s literally orders of magnitude apart. Even if you exclude Bitcoin’s first six years—a concession to those who argue the timeframe isn’t fair—gold and silver still get left in the dust by the crypto standard bearer.

The Precious Metals Paradox: Why Higher Prices Don’t Mean Better Performance

Gold advocate Peter Schiff recently pushed back, suggesting we should only look at the last four years instead of a longer timeframe. “Times have changed. Bitcoin’s time has passed,” he argued. But this argument reveals the core problem with commodities as a store of value.

Matt Golliher, co-founder of Orange Horizon Wealth, nailed the fundamental issue: commodity prices naturally converge toward production costs over time. It’s basic economics. When prices rise, miners ramp up production, flooding the market with fresh supply and dragging prices back down. “There are now sources of gold and silver that were not profitable to mine a year ago that are now quite profitable at current prices,” Golliher explained. This self-correcting mechanism means no matter how high precious metals climb, their upside gets capped by supply expansion.

Bitcoin operates under completely different rules. There will only ever be 21 million BTC. That’s it. No matter how much demand increases, no new supply can be created. This fixed-supply architecture is why Bitcoin has fundamentally outperformed every commodity designed to inflate infinitely.

The Dollar’s Collapse Could Change Everything

The real catalyst for asset prices right now is the weakening US dollar. The Dollar Index (DXY) has dropped nearly 10% in 2025—tracking toward its worst year in a decade. This includes depreciation against the euro, Japanese yen, British pound, Canadian dollar, Swedish krona, and Swiss franc.

Fed easing policy and rampant inflation are pushing money out of fiat currencies and into scarce assets. That’s creating a rare environment where gold, silver, and Bitcoin could all benefit from weakening dollar dynamics. However, the question remains: which asset captures the bulk of that flight capital? History suggests Bitcoin’s structural scarcity gives it an insurmountable advantage.

The debate between precious metals purists and Bitcoin maximalists will continue to resurface, especially as commodity prices hit new records. But the underlying math hasn’t changed. When one asset can inflate its supply and another cannot, the outcome was always predetermined.