Standard Chartered sees Bitcoin price at $1,20,000 by 2024

Bitcoin and predictions over its price are not a new fad. Many pundits have anticipated the price of the digital token to hit $1,00,000 by 2022 or 2023, but the largest crypto asset has seen a steep correction from around $68,000-mark and is currently holding $30,000-levels.

Standard Chartered is the latest one to join the predictors list with a target of $1,20,000 for Bitcoin by 2024. The investment banker has forecasted bitcoin to hit $50,000 by the end of this year, suggesting an upside of about 65 per cent from current levels.

Standard Chartered has been bullish about Crypto for the last few years. Before TradFi institutions started getting into DeFi in large numbers, the UK multinational bank had actively started promoting its Crypto vertical, even establishing and raising funds for its crypto custody platform, said Rajagopal Menon, VP at WazirX.

BlackRock's ETF application has pushed up Bitcoin's price and also prompted other Financial Institutions to dip their toes in Crypto. However, the optimism is based on the expectation that BlackRock's ETF application will be approved, the odds of which are high," he said.
 

One should also note that BlackRock Investment Management (UK) is also the third largest shareholder of Standard Chartered by equities with a valuation of £803 million. The multinational bank aims to boost investor sentiment around crypto by promoting these predictions, as they have previously sparked increased interest in Bitcoin, said the experts.

Predictions around Bitcoin's price have been very critical. Despite the industry's request towards bigger players to exercise caution, many prominent figures have continued this trend.

Standard Chartered, predicting the recent jump in Bitcoin's price could encourage bitcoin 'miners' to hoard more of the supply. It believes that the 'crypto winter' is over and the largest digital token has gained about 80 per cent since the beginning of the year.
 

At the onset of 2023, Bitcoin was trading below the $17,000 threshold. However, it has since witnessed a surge, reaching the $30,000 level, indicating a significant increase in demand. Despite the ongoing consolidation phase, the long-term outlook for investors remains largely positive, said Edul Patel, Co-founder and CEO at Mudrex.

"Bitcoin's impressive rally can be attributed to two key factors. Firstly, the upcoming halving event scheduled for 2024 is expected to create additional supply pressure, as it occurs once every four years. Secondly, the market participants remain optimistic about Bitcoin's price recovery, particularly with the increasing interest from financial institutions," he said.

Standard Chartered said the rationale for its predicted price rise was that miners who mint the 900 new bitcoins produced each day around the world would soon need to sell fewer to cover their costs - mostly electricity to power super-computers. It said that limited supply against the demand is likely to push the prices higher.

However, one should remember that crypto markets has wiped out trillion of dollars from investors and other stakeholder's kitty in 2022 as the central banks hiked interest rates and a number of crypto tokens, exchanges and projects including Terra (LUNA), FTX, Three Arrows and other imploded.

Bitcoin has always reached new all-time highs in each of its four-year halving cycles. We believe that it is definitely likely that the 2021 Bitcoin high of $69,000 will be overturned in the next 2 years. A high of $120,000 will be less than 2X multiple so it is a safe target to assume, said Vikram Subburaj, CEO at Giottus Crypto Platform.

"With the Fed rate hikes expected to end an imminent Bitcoin ETF, the tailwinds can easily catapult Bitcoin price to the stratosphere," he added. "Influx of retail investors after the end of US Fed rate hikes and an institutional push with spot ETF approvals can push this target much higher on sentiment. We believe that patient investors will reap rewards from these gains."

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