Gold Arrives on ‘Digital Gold’ as Bitcoin Gets Tokenized Version of the Metal

Bitcoin (BTC) is often referred to as “digital gold,” but now it will be possible to mint and trade physical gold on the Bitcoin blockchain via the Ordinals protocol for the first time. Swarm Markets, a real-world assets (RWA) platform licensed by German regulator BaFin, is offering investment in gold bars on the Bitcoin network in partnership with OrdinalsBot.

Gold will become the first RWA available on Trio, a marketplace developed by OrdinalsBot which is set to launch by the end of the year. Ordinals involves inscribing individual satoshis (the smallest unit of BTC at 1/100,000,000 of a full bitcoin) with data, such as images or text, making them unique and attaining individual value. They’re often thought of Bitcoin’s version of non-fungible tokens, or NFTs.

Swarm and OrdinalsBot’s service involves inscribing satoshis with unique gold kilobar serial numbers, in effect allowing them to be traded on Bitcoin’s Ordinals protocol. Bitcoin is often compared to gold because of the properties they share as a store of value due to their finite supply. However, BTC does not always perform as well as gold during risk-off situations. This was highlighted in the third quarter of this year amid concerns of a U.S. recession when gold climbed 10% to record highs while BTC managed a negligible 0.8% gain.

“Investors no longer need to debate whether they should hold real or digital gold, when Swarm’s Ordinals offer the ability to hold both simultaneously using one blockchain as a common infrastructure,” Swarm co-founder Timo Lehes said in an announcement shared with CoinDesk on Thursday.