Investing.com - Comparisons to the dot.com era are rarely good.
And that's the case with Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS)'s analysis, which says bitcoin is behaving the way the Nasdaq did two decades ago.
In a note to clients, the Wall Street firm identified general similarities between the price movements and trading volumes of the Nasdaq in late 1999 and early 2000 and bitcoin in late 2017 and early 2018.
Both the Nasdaq and bitcoin posted rallies of more than 250%, before entering sharp downturns.
Once the downturns began, both suffered multiple waves of weakness with average declines of about 45%.
In both cases, there were multiple bear market rallies with average gains of about 40%.
Finally, trading volume was much higher during the downturn periods than the rally periods, indicating what Morgan Stanley calls a "a rush to get out."
There is one main difference, though. The bitcoin rally played out in a much shorter period of time.