Good morning, investors. Stocks, gold, bitcoin, and home prices are all smashing records this year. But the boom isn’t all it appears — and we have the charts to prove it below.

The S&P 500 and home prices are at record highs, but when you price them in hard assets instead of dollars the “everything rally” disappears.

If you measure prices in dollars, this looks like the golden age for wealth.

The illusion fades once you look past nominal dollars to real purchasing power. 

Since 2020, the US dollar’s purchasing power has fallen more than 20% while cumulative inflation has increased 25%.

Meanwhile, the S&P 500 is up 106%, and home prices, as measured by the S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index, have appreciated 52%. 

That conundrum also explains why everyday Americans continue to feel downbeat about the economic outlook. 

The record highs investors celebrate are as much a byproduct of a shrinking yardstick as genuine value creation. 

Despite the S&P 500 doubling in nominal terms over the last five years, it’s collapsed in bitcoin terms, and remains down 13% when priced in gold. 

The same pattern holds for home prices denominated in bitcoin and gold. 

As the charts illustrate, this dynamic is not new, though the majority of global investors still haven’t caught on. 

It was only last week JPMorgan strategists led by Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou published a note citing the “debasement trade” — the rise of gold and bitcoin in the face of persistent government deficits, inflation, and waning faith in fiat currencies.

Indeed, retail inflows into hard-asset ETFs have steadily increased while institutional positioning has lagged, suggesting the shift is being driven from the ground up, rather than top down. 

Equity and property investors have been able to outpace currency debasement over the last five years, and that appears unlikely to change anytime soon. 

Markets will continue to secure new all-time highs, though only in nominal terms.

The debasement trade, now that it’s been formalized by JPMorgan, simply gives a name to what’s already been unfolding for years. 

As long as the US dollar remains in a structural bear market, the bull market in asset prices will keep feeling stronger than it actually is.

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📊Stock funds are on pace for a third straight year of double-digits gains. The average equity fund rose 7.2% in the third quarter, pushing year-to-date gains to 11%, according to LSEG data. (WSJ)

🤝 Wall Street is having a banner M&A year. So far in 2025, companies have announced 49 global M&A transactions that are valued at more than $10 billion. That’s the highest such count through 9 months of any year ever. (Yahoo Finance)

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📰 I’m Phil Rosen, co-founder and editor-in-chief of Opening Bell Daily. I’ve published books, lived on three continents, and won awards for my journalism, which has appeared in Business Insider, Fortune, Yahoo Finance, Bloomberg and Inc. Magazine.

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