A pitiful "capitulation" followed by a spectacular rehabilitation: That could sum up 2023 for bitcoin, the best-known cryptoasset. In bad shape at the start of the year after the momentous scandal at FTX – the trading platform whose co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried was mistaking customer funds for his personal wallet – it is now showing a rise of over 150% in its dollar price since the start of the year, to $43,000 (€39,000), compared with less than $17,000 a year ago.

By contrast, Wall Street's Standard & Poor's 500 index is up "only" 24%. This benchmark of the financial "old world" does still have one advantage: In December, it practically regained its all-time high, while bitcoin remains far from its own, which it reached in November 2021 at almost $68,000.

Bitcoin's 2023 performance is far from isolated: Many lesser-known cryptoassets, such as Ethereum and Solana, have benefited greatly in recent months from renewed investor interest.

And this trend reversal is fueling the euphoria of some industry players: Brian Armstrong, CEO of the exchange platform Coinbase, declared on December 4 on X that "bitcoin may be the key to extending Western civilization." Nothing less.

Crypto has come a long way: In February, three months after the collapse of FTX, the sector was targeted by the US financial authorities, who seemed determined to subject it to strict regulation. At that time, the price of bitcoin was struggling to stay above $20,000.

"The FTX crisis sounded the hour of capitulation for bitcoin," explained Alexandre Baradez, analyst at the broker IG. "Once the abscess was punctured, it took a few months for the market to stabilize before entering the current bullish phase."

This rebound accelerated beginning in mid-October, benefiting in particular from the easing of financial conditions in the United States: The prospect of a halt to the Federal Reserve's interest rate hike, or even of a rate cut in the coming months, made assets such as gold and bitcoin, long disadvantaged by their lack of yield, more attractive.

Buoyed by monetary easing, bitcoin's return to favor was only briefly disrupted when Binance, another major international cryptoasset exchange platform, was forced to pay $4 billion in fines to close investigations into suspected violations of US anti-money-laundering laws. This outcome also forced the resignation of the company's iconic founder, Changpeng Zhao, known as "CZ."

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