Bitcoin Hits New Highs but No One Seems Interested? Key Research Analysis: Wall Street Media's "Selective Blindness"

Bitcoin (BTC) reached a historic high of $112,040 this week, shocking global markets and once again proving its status as the best-performing asset of the past decade. However, it is perplexing that when flipping through mainstream Wall Street media such as The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and The New York Times, there are very few articles linked to this milestone, creating a stark contrast between "price clamor" and "media silence." This inevitably raises the question: why are these elite media outlets ignoring Bitcoin's strong performance? What kind of information asymmetry risks are hidden behind this?

Bitcoin Hits New Highs Yet Remains Low-Key: Mainstream Media's 'Selective Blindness'

Market intelligence company Perception conducted a statistical analysis of 18 mainstream media outlets and 1,116 cryptocurrency reports, revealing some surprising phenomena. In the second quarter of 2025, the overall reporting sentiment showed polarization, with 31% holding a positive view, 41% holding a neutral view, and 28% holding a negative view. However, beneath these numbers lies a significant divergence among the various media outlets.

The most striking aspect is the near silence of elite financial publications: The Wall Street Journal has published only 2 articles about Bitcoin, the Financial Times has published 11, and the New York Times has also published only 11. The coverage from these three media outlets accounts for just 2% of the total. Considering Bitcoin's status as the best-performing asset over the past decade, this is truly a shocking absence. The Perception report summarizes three narrative pathways of mainstream media regarding Bitcoin:

"Enthusiastic Adoption" camp: Media outlets like Forbes, CNBC, and Barron's have extensively covered retail and institutional adoption, Bitcoin ETF development, and the mining industry, with a large volume of reporting that is mostly positive.

"Deliberately Ignoring" Camp: Represented by The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and The New York Times, with very few reports and a tone that is mostly neutral or reserved.

"Continuous skepticism" camp: Comprehensive media and Fox News focus on criminal activities, regulatory risks, and security, with reports mostly negative.

This phenomenon of "deliberate ignorance" reveals more about the possibility that these media may be controlled by traditional institutions, rather than being a correlation issue related to Bitcoin.

The Silence Behind: Information Asymmetry and Investment Risk

When investors rely on elite media as their primary source of information, they can easily fall into a limited perspective. The Perception report warns: "Investors may therefore be 'systemically underreporting' the importance of Bitcoin in today's financial system."

Despite Bitcoin having another outstanding quarter, despite major companies adding billions of dollars in corporate bonds, and despite ETF trading volumes skyrocketing, media coverage of Bitcoin has been less than that of declining retail quarterly earnings. The UK Financial Times and Wall Street Journal—two media outlets that spare no effort in reporting every basis point movement in Italian bond yields—believe that the best-performing asset of this century is not worth more coverage than the European Central Bank meeting minutes.

When Barron's published 65 articles about Bitcoin, while its parent company The Wall Street Journal published only 2; when CNBC published 141 articles and the Financial Times published only 11, what we are witnessing is not Bitcoin's failure to gain institutional recognition. What we see is traditional financial media's failure to meet the informational needs of readers.

The "ostrich strategy" of this elite financial media has led to a serious information asymmetry. Institutional investors relying on The Wall Street Journal/The Financial Times for market information face a systemic lack of information regarding this transformative asset class. This is not a blind spot of Bitcoin, but rather their own blind spot.

The Most Constructive Media: Embracing Market Reality

Compared to the "willful blindness" of elite media, some high-capacity financial media demonstrate a more constructive reporting attitude:

Forbes: Published 194 articles, with positive sentiment accounting for 43% and negative for 24%. It has replaced The Wall Street Journal as the most influential financial publication in the digital asset economy. Forbes reports on the real factors driving the market and reshaping finance, rather than sticking to asset classes from the 20th century.

CNBC: Published 141 articles, with positive sentiment accounting for 42% and negative sentiment 17%. The reporting ratio of CNBC (70 times that of The Wall Street Journal) shows who is serving traders and investors and who is protecting institutional orthodox views. CNBC views Bitcoin as a large market trading tens of billions of dollars daily.

"Fortune": Published 117 articles, with 25% positive sentiment and 18% negative. Fortune magazine demonstrates how to maintain a skeptical attitude while seriously reporting on Bitcoin. Its reporting volume is 58 times that of The Wall Street Journal, proving that it is possible to maintain credibility while acknowledging market realities.

The contradiction between negative reports and market acceptance

Even those media outlets that report more negative content at least acknowledge the news value of Bitcoin:

The Independent: Published 45 articles, with positive sentiment at 18% and negative at 42%. Despite ongoing skepticism, its coverage of Bitcoin is 22 times more than that of the Wall Street Journal, at least acknowledging the existence of Bitcoin.

Fox News: Published 32 articles, with a positive sentiment of 28% and a negative sentiment of 38%. Its reporting volume is 16 times more than that of The Wall Street Journal, showing its contradictory narrative that oscillates between legitimacy and fear, but is at least relevant to reality.

Barron's: Published 65 articles, with 25% positive sentiment and 27% negative sentiment. Its parent company, The Wall Street Journal, only published 2 articles, while its trading-focused subsidiary published 65 articles, revealing a dysfunction in The Wall Street Journal's editorial function.

As the price of Bitcoin hits a new high, it also reminds the market to reflect: in an age where information is flying everywhere, what truly deserves attention is not just where the rises and falls are, but which voices are left outside the microphone. Regardless of how the narratives diverge, institutional ETFs and corporate balance sheets have gradually included Bitcoin, indicating that its position in the mainstream asset pool continues to solidify.

Although high-frequency financial media and social platforms fill the vacuum left by mainstream media, they may also amplify emotional fluctuations and speculation, even creating information echo chambers. In other words, the real risk may not come from price volatility, but from an imbalanced background of sources. In the face of possible neglect and silence from elite media, investors need to actively collect information across platforms, compare data, and establish diverse perspectives. Cross-verification from multiple sources is not just a preparatory step for adjusting asset allocation, but also a core hedging tool to avoid information bias.

Bitcoin no longer needs The Wall Street Journal, just as Netflix no longer needs Blockbuster's approval. But those investors who rely on channels that ignore the best-performing asset of this century are not protected from risk. They are blinded by reality. The issue is not whether Bitcoin is legitimate enough for The Wall Street Journal, but rather whether The Wall Street Journal still matters.