Bitcoin's Correlation With the Nasdaq Swung From -0.68 to +0.72 in Two Weeks
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5 min read
On 3 February 2026, bitcoin's 30-day rolling correlation with the Nasdaq was -0.68. Two weeks later it was +0.72. Same asset, same index, a swing of 1.4 in fourteen days, during a tech selloff driven by fears about AI disrupting the industry.
That is not a rounding error. That is bitcoin going from "moves opposite to tech stocks" to "moves almost exactly with tech stocks" in half a month.
The pitch for bitcoin has always split two ways: "digital gold" that sits apart from the stock market, or "leveraged tech stock" that rides the same wave as Nasdaq names, just harder. 2026's data says the honest answer is: it depends which two weeks you're looking at, and the pattern behind that isn't random.
Correlation is a number from -1 to +1 that says how closely two things move together. +1 means lockstep. 0 means no relationship. -1 means they move in exact opposite directions.
A "30-day rolling correlation" recalculates that number every day using only the most recent 30 days, so it can move fast when the market regime changes. If you want the fuller primer on how this works and why it matters for diversification, the correlation with the S&P 500 piece covers that ground. This post stays specifically on the Nasdaq and tech-stock relationship, because that is the "digital gold or leveraged Nasdaq trade" question people actually mean when they ask if bitcoin is "just tech stocks now."
Episode one: the correlation spike during a selloff. From 3 to 17 February 2026, bitcoin's 30-day correlation with the Nasdaq swung from -0.68 to +0.72 as AI-disruption fears triggered a broader tech selloff. Bitcoin fell 1.25% to around $68,000 that week, tracking weakness in Nasdaq futures. Gold fell too, down 2.4% the same day, so even the "safe haven" asset was not offering shelter during that particular stretch (CoinDesk, 17 February 2026).
Episode two: bitcoin decoupling and running on its own. By mid-March, the relationship had flipped again. Bitcoin posted its best week since September 2025, rising about 8.5% to trade above $71,000, while a tech-heavy software ETF (IGV) rose only around 3%, gold fell about 6%, and US equities also lost ground. Bitcoin had gained roughly 13% over the prior two weeks on its own catalyst, a geopolitical flare-up in the Middle East, while tech stocks did not follow. US spot bitcoin ETFs pulled in about $1.3 billion that month, the first month of net inflows since October (CoinDesk, 15 March 2026).
Episode three: bitcoin as an amplifier, not a mirror. On 5 August 2026, the Nasdaq-100 rallied 3.3% to 29,733 in a single session, one of the ten most bullish single-day options-market signals of the past decade according to Scott Nations of Nations Indexes. Analysts describe bitcoin's reaction to Nasdaq swings as one of the more reliable patterns in crypto trading right now: when the index rises, bitcoin tends to rise more, and when it falls, bitcoin tends to fall harder, to the point that a 5% Nasdaq pullback could plausibly translate into a 10%-or-larger bitcoin drawdown (Cryptonomist, 5 August 2026). That is a rough 2x amplifier, not a 1:1 mirror.
The mechanism is not mysterious. Since the January 2024 US spot bitcoin ETF approvals, a growing share of bitcoin sits inside the same brokerage accounts, retirement portfolios and institutional risk models as Nasdaq mega-caps. When those investors need to cut risk fast, whether because of a Fed decision, an inflation print, or an AI-industry scare, they often sell across their whole risk basket at once, not just the stock piece of it. That pushes correlation up sharply during selloffs specifically.
The opposite is not equally true. Bitcoin can rally hard on a purely crypto-specific or geopolitical catalyst without pulling tech stocks along with it, which is what broke the correlation in March 2026. The relationship is asymmetric: tight on the way down during a shared shock, looser on the way up when bitcoin has its own story.
For a portfolio, that asymmetry matters more than the average correlation number. A "diversifier" that only decouples on good days and locks in with the market on bad days is not offering much protection when protection is actually needed.
The Nasdaq-100 sits at levels above 29,500 as of 11 August 2026, close to its record range, while bitcoin trades in the low $60,000s, still well off its own late-2025 peak. If your portfolio holds both bitcoin and Nasdaq-heavy growth stocks, treating them as separate risk sleeves right now would be assuming a diversification benefit the 2026 data does not consistently support.
The Explore screener lets you filter assets by type (stock, crypto, ETF) and compare volatility, maximum drawdown and Sharpe ratio side by side, which is a more direct way to see whether your bitcoin position and your tech holdings are actually carrying different risk right now, rather than assuming it from the asset labels. You can also track bitcoin's own price and volatility on its asset page.