The ETF ‘juggernaut’ and three other reasons Bitcoin will reach $70,000 this year

No significant challenges are expected to prevent Bitcoin’s price from rising past its highest ever level of $69,000 this year, and will even go beyond that to $70,000.

That’s according to analysts at investment firm Bernstein.

“While we are not calling for a straight volatility free climb to all-time-highs, we are comfortable with the risk-reward for the rest of 2024 at today’s price,” analysts Gautam Chhugani and Mahika Sapra wrote in a note to investors.

Bitcoin briefly scraped $49,000 after 10 Bitcoin spot exchange-traded funds launched in the US on January 11, and is currently trading for roughly $42,600.

The report added that the $42,000 to $43,000 range was a “no-regrets price with asymmetric upside” and predicted that Bitcoin would rise another 65% to approximately $70,000 before the end of the year.

Analysts Chhugani and Sapra gave four reasons for their bullishness.

‘ETF juggernaut’

The first was ETF net inflows, which totalled approximately 19,000 Bitcoin last week alone, according to Bernstein.

“The ETF juggernaut will continue to become material to price action,” the analysts said. “In a commodity with a known finite supply curve, any incremental buying demand at this scale will become material to price.”

The second reason to be optimistic about Bitcoin, according to Bernstein, is that ETF issuers are receiving “unprecedented and accelerated” responses from advisor networks on how to potentially allocate Bitcoin in client portfolios — suggesting that ETFs may have indeed unlocked a long-term source of Bitcoin demand.

A CoinShares report released today indicated that a net $708 million had flowed into institutional crypto investment products last week alone — bringing total net flows to $1.6 billion since January 1.

Bitcoin accounted for 99% of these flows.

Rates

Macroeconomic conditions also look favourable, said Bernstein.

The Federal Reserve has signalled that it may cut interest rates, which are between 5% and 5.25%.

With lower rates, savings will become less desirable and investors will look for returns elsewhere. Risk assets, including Bitcoin, tend to perform better on lower interest rates.

Election impact on SEC

Monetary policy aside, Bernstein said the crypto market could potentially rally on a Republican win in the US presidential election — as it would imply a change of leadership at the Securities and Exchange Commission.

SEC chairman Gary Gensler has been criticised by the crypto industry and lawmakers alike for his enforcement-heavy approach to crypto regulation.

Bitcoin’s fourth tailwind is the growth of its onchain ecosystem, according to Bernstein.

Ordinals

“We expect layer 2s to continue to drive transaction revenues for the miners, and economic activity from token mints and Ordinals to sustain, as the Bitcoin developer ecosystem grows,” the report said.

The Ordinals protocol is a way to give unique identifiers to a fraction of a Bitcoin — thereby turning it into something akin to an NFT.

Ed Goh, head of trading at crypto trading firm B2C2, echoed Bernstein’s sentiment.

“Bitcoin has shown a noticeable preference for buyers,” he told DL News in an email.

“Investment patterns in cryptocurrency remain robust with an even split in investment coming from crypto-native funds, retail brokers, and proprietary trading firms, therefore continuing the trend we have seen so far this year,” he added.

Tom Carreras is a markets correspondent at DL News. Got a tip about Bitcoin and markets? Reach out at tcarreras@dlnews.com