Ray Dalio says he has a little bitcoin but prefers gold, calling it 'timeless and universal'

• Billionaire investor Ray Dalio said he has a little bitcoin but prefers gold.
• On a recent podcast, he said bitcoin is volatile and has a smaller valuation than mega-cap stocks like Microsoft.
• "I don't understand why people are more inclined to go to bitcoin than gold."

Ray Dalio said he holds a small amount of bitcoin, but the cryptocurrency moves in unreliable ways and the billionaire investor favors gold.

"I would prefer gold," he said on Chris Williamson's YouTube podcast this week, pointing out that bitcoin has a smaller valuation than mega-cap stocks like Microsoft.

On Thursday, bitcoin's market cap was about $574 billion, compared to Microsoft's $2.27 trillion.

"I don't understand why people are more inclined to go to bitcoin than gold. If you look internationally, gold is, for central banks, the third highest reserve asset," the Bridgewater Associates founder said. "First is dollars, then euros, then gold, and Japanese yen. And central bankers are buying gold, and they're not buying bonds. And it's timeless and universal."

Dalio added that he isn't a big fan of bitcoin, while acknowledging he has "a little bit of it." 

But even with a small holding, bitcoin's volatility demands an outsized amount of attention from investors, he warned.

"But if you have a little bit of it, you have to think about those things. Like I said, you have to be prepared for it to fall a lot, if it goes down 80% or something. But that limits the amount that you can have," Dalio said. "So I don't know. I don't think a lot of bitcoin."

While bitcoin remains well off its November 2021 high of $67,000, it has soared 80% so far this year to nearly $30,000. 

Its rally has coincided with hopes for a pause in Federal Reserve rate hikes and the banking turmoil caused by Silicon Valley Bank's collapse in March.

A Standard Chartered note on Monday said bitcoin is an attractive asset during stress periods thanks to its decentralized nature, adding that it could skyrocket towards $100,000 by the end of 2024.