FxWirePro Poll: Bitcoin seen to nearly double by end-2018 on demand recovery

Bitcoin is forecast to nearly double and erase much of its losses made this year by end-2018, largely driven by a recovery in investors demand and renewed optimism among market players, an FxWirePro poll showed.

In the past few weeks, investors have turned overly bullish regarding the digital currency’s performance over the coming months and beyond, after witnessing a heavy sell-off at the start of this year.

Recent reports have conveyed that Google and Facebook, besides, other social media have accepted to once again cast crypto ads on their sites, after a brief period of knockdown.

So far this month, most popular cryptocurrency recovered nearly 14 percent after plunging to a 7-month low of $5,763 in June. That recovery is expected to sustain this year.

According to the median forecast of nearly dozen research organization and institutional investors, taken July 16-28, the Bitcoin prices are seen reaching $15,372 by December this year. While 3 predicted BTC/USD to remain in the range of $5k-10k, 5 forecast it to surge to the $15k-30k zone. Only one forecasting prices to drop below $2.5k.

Jeet Singh, a portfolio manager, predicted BTC/USD to jump to $50k, while delivering a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos. He also compared cryptocurrencies to early tech giants like Microsoft and Apple.

"If you are looking for virtual currencies with a good return, BTC can be a profitable investment option. Based on our forecasts, a long-term increase is expected, the price prognosis for 2023-07-20 is 42,812.60 US Dollars. With a 5-year investment, the revenue is expected to be around +410.2 percent. The Bitcoin price can go up from $8,398.07 to $14,007.90 in one year," noted Rácz-Akácosi Attila, founder and CEO of Walletinvestor.

Billionaire investor and founder of Avenue Capital Group Marc Lasry has forecasted bitcoin to jump to $40k over the next few years, holding faith in the digital asset’s performance, while commenting to the CNBC on July 18.

When asked what is Bitcoin’s trading environment today, Michael Abboud, a senior vice president at Trust Company of Oklahoma in its July investment perspectives said prior to December 17, 2017 it was extremely difficult to make bets against the price of Bitcoin for two main reasons: no derivative market existed to do so and about 40 percent of all bitcoins were held by approximately 1,000 users.  These holders often coordinated their buys and sells of Bitcoin, and could easily fend off bets on the decline in price of Bitcoin. All that changed when futures for Bitcoin started trading on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME).

The Bitcoin pessimists could now bet on the price of Bitcoin declining by selling a promise to deliver Bitcoin at some point in the future at a lower price than the current market price. As short-selling pressure continued to build, Bitcoin’s price eventually bottomed at the same price it currently trades – around $6,400, declining some 66 percent from its all-time $19,511 high. Currently, the market capitalization of all 1,629 cryptocurrencies is $259 billion, with Bitcoin at roughly 40 percent of that ($110 billion). To put that into perspective, the market

capitalization of all cryptocurrencies combined is a few billion greater than Intel Corporation’s stock market capitalization of $232 billion, he added.

REPLACE FIAT CURRENCY?

Speculation among crypto investors that over time, the fiat currency will be replaced by cryptocurrencies has always remained under question. Bitcoin’s journey over the past decade has not proven much of its worthiness to do so.

In contrast to what bitcoin advocates claim, the cryptocurrency has not yet proved itself as a reliable and good means of payment. As a store of value, bitcoin’s extreme price fluctuations amid news of exchange hacks further adds to its discrepancies.

Even though we don’t know if the ‘hype’ was driving the Bitcoin price or the price was driving the ‘hype’, but economists and cryptoanalysts are not concerned about its impact on global financial stability.

"It's worth noting that according to the Financial Stability Board crypto assets don't pose risks to global financial stability as their combined market value remains less than one percent of global GDP, at least as of March 2018," said Carlo Cocuzzo economist - thematic research at ING Bank in a note.

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