At Tuesday's price, the digital currency has more than tripled for the year, versus gold's nearly 10 percent rise.

"I think bitcoin is going to have increasing institutional sponsorship given the pending trading of bitcoin options and bitcoin futures," Fundstrat said.

Both derivatives products are expected to launch later this year or in early 2018.

That said, gold is far from disappearing as a store of value.

Lee pointed out that the overall size of the gold market at about $7.5 trillion dwarfs that of bitcoin. At Tuesday's prices, bitcoin had a market capitalization of roughly $57 billion, around the size of Charles Schwab.

In that case, Lee and other analysts have noted that even a small percentage of fund flows out of gold into bitcoin could send the digital currency's price sharply higher, potentially into the tens of thousands of dollars in the next few years.

Other digital currencies also rose Tuesday. The one-week-old bitcoin offshoot "bitcoin cash" rebounded from weekend lows near $200 to trade near $338.25, according to CoinMarketCap.

Ethereum traded nearly 5 percent higher at $280, about 12 percent higher for the month, according to CoinDesk.

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Bitcoin climbs to record, nearly three times the price of gold - CNBC