As we enter 2023, market players have been giving some extreme predictions for the BTC price from the $5,000 to $250,000 range.
The last year of 2022 witnessed one of the harshest crypto winters in the history of crypto markets. The world’s largest cryptocurrency corrected by nearly 60% the last year and many analysts believe that the bottom is not yet in. Some market experts believe that 2023 would be a pretty volatile year for crypto investors and for Bitcoin (BTC) as well. However, the broader market opinion remains very wide and highly divided. The global macro outlook seems absolutely uncertain and interest rates have been on the rise worldwide. Despite the Fed slowing down on the speed of rate hikes, it still has confirmed further hikes this year.
As a result, risk-ON assets like stocks and crypto will continue to stay under selling pressure. Let’s take a look at the Bitcoin price prediction made by market veterans and other financial institutions.
Tim Draper and His Expectations for Bitcoin (BTC) in 2023
Bitcoin bull Tim Draper has set a price target of $250,000 for the cryptocurrency by the end of this year. This is ~15x from the current price levels. It is also one of the most optimistic predictions for the BTC price and might seem unrealistic to many.
Interestingly, Tim Draper remains bullish on his BTC price predictions despite the recent events and collapse of the crypto exchange FTX. In an email to CNBC, Draper wrote:
“My assumption is that since women control 80% of retail spending, and only 1 in 7 bitcoin wallets are currently held by women that the dam is about to break”.
Draper also added that another reason behind his bullish optimism is the Bitcoin halving event coming ahead in mid-2024. The Bitcoin halving event happens every four years and leads to squeezing the BTC supply. This development is seen as bullish by market players.
However, during the last year, as the BTC price plummeted, there was heavy selling pressure by Bitcoin miners to meet the operational costs. “If the market reaches a point where it’s absorbing this miner sell pressure sufficiently, one can assume that we’re seeing a bottoming period,” said Vijay Ayyar, vice president of corporate development at crypto exchange Luno.
Standard Chartered
Banking giant Standard Chartered has predicted an extreme bear case scenario for the Bitcoin price. As per Standard Chartered, the BTC price could sink to as low as $5000. If true, this would mean another 70% correction from the current levels. The banking giant is also expecting more news of bankruptcies in the crypto space. Eric Robertsen, the bank’s global head of research, said:
“Yields plunge along with technology shares” in Standard Chartered’s nightmare 2023 scenario, “and while the Bitcoin sell-off decelerates, the damage has been done. More and more crypto firms and exchanges find themselves with insufficient liquidity, leading to further bankruptcies and a collapse in investor confidence in digital assets”.
Mark Mobius and VanEck
Veteran market investor Mark Mobius has been relatively successful with his BTC price predictions last year. Back in May 2022, Mobius said that the BTC price can further fall to $20,000, just when it was trading above $28,000.
Mobius had further predicted a fall of the BTC price to $10,000 last year, however, that didn’t happen. But going into 2023, Mobius is sticking to his prediction. But Mark Mobius is not alone to expect the BTC price to drop to $10,000.
Bitcoin ETF issuer VanEck Investments recently predicted that Bitcoin can drop to $10K-$12K by the first quarter of 2023. But VanEck expects that Bitcoin will once again rise to $30K by the second half of the year. “Lower inflation, easing energy concerns, a possible truce in Ukraine, and a turnaround in M2 supply will power the start of a new bull market,” it added.
Bhushan is a FinTech enthusiast and holds a good flair in understanding financial markets. His interest in economics and finance draw his attention towards the new emerging Blockchain Technology and Cryptocurrency markets. He is continuously in a learning process and keeps himself motivated by sharing his acquired knowledge. In free time he reads thriller fictions novels and sometimes explore his culinary skills.
