JPMorgan strategists led by Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou have revealed in a recently published note that “unless bitcoin volatility subsides quickly form here” the cryptocurrency’s rally, which saw it surpass the $50,000 mark, “looks unsustainable.”
In the note the analysts referenced bitcoin at $48,000. Since then, the price of the flagship cryptocurrency has broke the resistance at $50,000 and made a new all-time high above $51,500 before enduring a small correction that saw it recede to $51,300 at press time.
The strategists wrote that bitcoin’s market capitalization has, since last September, increased by about $700 billion, even though institutional investor inflows were estimated to be of only around $11 billion.
Justifying the market capitalization’s rise, the strategists noted that movements since the beginning of this year “appear to have been more influenced by speculative flows,” and added:
This also suggests that some pickup in real money flows would likely be needed to sustain current prices in the absence of a re-acceleration of the retail flow.
As TheBlock reports, JPMorgan’s analysts added that retail inflows have been “particularly strong since January and there is little doubt that this retail impulse has been a driving force not only for equities, but also for bitcoin.”
The strategists also compared BTC’s volatility with that of gold, and said bitcoin’s biggest fund, the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), consumers on average 6.2x more risk capital than gold’s largest exchange-traded fund by assets under management, GLD.
Risk Capital, according to Investopedia, refers to funds allocated to speculative activity and “used for high-risk, high-reward investments.” The prospects of risk capital investments tend to be “uncertain by nature” although returns can be far above average when an investment succeeds, it adds.
Looking at the launch of ETH futures by the CME Group, the strategists said that their initial slow traction is similar to the one seen on CME’s bitcoin futures contracts in the beginning. In their opinion, it won’t take too long for ETH futures to gain traction as “investor interest in cryptocurrencies has had a few years to mature.”
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