On Monday (May 11), also known as Bitcoin Halving Day, Mike Novogratz, a former Goldman Sachs partner, as well as Founder, Chairman, and CEO of crypto-focused merchant bank Galaxy Digital, commented on Bitcoin and Ethereum, and more specifically where he thinks their prices are going from here.
His comments were delivered on Tuesday (April 7) during an interview with Melissa Lee on CNBC’s post-market show “Fast Money” at a time when BTC-USD was trading at $8,647.
Lee started by asking Novogratz what his thoughts were on the halving event, and wanted to know if he agreed with her that it seemed to be a “sell the news” kind of event.
Novogratz reminded us that Bitcoin had had “a huge rally” from its Black Thursday (March 12) lows with “a lot of retail participation”, that Bitcoin “makes so much sense” against the current backdrop of massive quantitative easing by major central banks, and that legendary macro investor Paul Tudor Jones II has said that he is buying Bitcoin (or Bitcoin futures) for one of the hedge funds he is managing (i.e. Tudor Investment Corporation’s “BVI Global Fund”).
Next, he said that it seems that recent pre-halving “retail frenzy” (or FOMO) has gotten “sold off”, and that he expected Bitcoin to stabilize around the $8,500 level before taking off again.
Next, he talked about what he is seeing/hearing from the clients of Galaxy Digital:
“We’re seeing in our shop a huge increase in interest in Bitcoin, in getting into crypto from high-net-worth individuals, from funds… It feels like a herd is on its way, finally…
“I’ve been waiting and waiting for the institutional side. I think this [Paul] Tudor Jones news is very big news because in some ways it takes the career risk of looking dumb out of buying Bitcoin. It credentializes [Bitcoin] as a macro weapon.
“It might or might not work, but people are not going to say ‘you were a fool to do that’…
“… and I think it will allow other hedge funds to participate as well.”
As for where he thinks the Bitcoin price is going, Novogratz reiterated his previously stated prediction that the price will reach $20,000 by the end of the year.
With regards to Ethereum and ErisX’s announcement about the launch of its physically-delivered Ether futures contracts, Novogratz had this to say:
“The other projects, Ethereum being the most promising and second-biggest, really continue to need to develop the underlying technology so it’s used more often… As the Ethereum project grows, I think the value will go up…
“But I don’t think it’s today’s news. It will get dragged along with Bitcoin but [will then] accelerate on its own, probably for a year or two until it really gets users on the platform.
“It will be a network effect: the more programmers, the more coders, the more businesses over time, the value will go up.”
Novogratz also spoke to Lee about Bitcoin during an interview on April 21. Here is what he said about Bitcoin back then:
“I have a big position in gold [and] a very big position in Bitcoin.
“I think Bitcoin has this moment right now where just today we did another half a trillion dollars of stimulus… just money growing on trees, and my mother taught me when I was young money doesn’t grow on trees.
“And so, as we have more and more just fiscal stimulus being monetized by the central bank, more and more people I talk to want to find something with scarcity.
“There are only 21 million bitcoins ever going to be mined. 87% of them have already been mined. Next month, the inflation rate gets cut in half, and so there’s a really good story, and the problem we’ve had up until now has been one of adoption…
“I am seeing more and more people starting to buy, calling me up, wanting to learn about it, and so my sense is you’re going to have the macro tailwind plus the adoption tailwind happening in bitcoin.”
And finally, it is worth remembering what Novogratz told Rebecca Quick during an interview on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on April 7:
“I have a big Bitcoin position. I continue to add to it partly because I think this is an amazing environment for both being long gold and long Bitcoin.
“Nancy Pelosi came out today to talk about another trillion dollars of stimulus.
“Money is growing on trees right now. I learned as a little kid that money really doesn’t grow on trees, and so we have a global money printing orgy going on.
“And maybe it’s necessary, but at one point that comes home to roost, and so I think hard assets are going be a big buy. Gold [and] Bitcoin are my two favorites…”
