In a year when whipsawing markets are poised to end much higher, one of Wall Street’s most curious investments could come out on top: bitcoin.

The digital currency is one of the best-performing assets of 2016, rising more than 124 percent since the start of the year — as investors in China and India push the price near all-time highs.

That far outpaces other strong-performing investments, like the Dow Jones industrial average, which has risen a solid 13.7 percent this year, to 19,819.78.

One unit of bitcoin rose to $967.99 by late Thursday, the highest level in nearly three years, and investors are waiting for it to cross the $1,000 mark.

Bitcoin hit an all-time high of $1,137 on Nov. 29, 2013.

“It’s gonna happen,” Marc van der Chijs, managing partner at CrossPacific Capital and a bitcoin investor, told The Post. “Whether it’s going to happen before Dec. 31, nobody really knows.”

Wealthy investors have fueled a surge in bitcoin as the value of the Chinese yuan and the Indian rupee have fallen since the election of Donald Trump, he added.

“People underestimate how important the Trump election is on bitcoin,” van der Chijs said. “People are worried. They don’t really know what’s going to happen.”

One traditional hedge, gold, has fallen 9 percent since Nov. 8, to $1,159.55 an ounce.

“The Chinese are hedging their bets,” van der Chijs said.

Bitcoin is still a niche market for most investors.

Created eight years ago by a mysterious cryptographer who called himself Satoshi Nakamoto, bitcoin gained a niche as a way for people to buy and sell goods securely and anonymously online — without the backing of a government or a central bank.

“It’s based on trust, based on the fact that other people see value as well,” van der Chijs said. “It’s not backed by anything. It’s backed by mathematical equations.”

While it’s drawn praise from technologists and market bears — including Mick Mulvaney, who is Donald Trump’s pick to run the Office of Management and Budget — bitcoin has been tainted by its association with shadier corners of the internet, including online drug bazaar The Silk Road and the imploded exchange Mt. Gox.

Two investors who are trying to bring the digital currency to the mainstream are Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss — the twins who famously claimed to co-invent Facebook.

The Winklevii are looking to win government approval for a bitcoin exchange-traded fund next year.