Popular cryptocurrency strategist and former Wall Street trader Max Keiser has reaffirmed he believes the price of bitcoin will hit $220,000, but changed his prediction to this year as his previous prediction, for 2021, ultimately failed to materialize.

According to a tweet Keiser published, he believes that the computing power behind the network, the hashrate, precedes the cryptocurrency’s price, which would mean that a new high in hashrate will translate to a new high in price.

Notably, Bitcoin’s hashrate grew 49% year-over-year from 136.5 exahashes per second (EH/s) in early January 2021 to over 203.5 EH/s this week, a new all-time high. In July last year, the network’s hashrate plummeted to a 68 EH/s low after China’s crackdown on the crypto mining industry, but it has since recovered after major Bitcoin miners moved their operations to the United States and Kazakhstan.

Keiser, it’s worth noting, has in the past signaled he believes bitcoin’s hashrate precedes potential price movements and used it to make bullish predictions on the price of the flagship cryptocurrency.

As CryptoGlobe reported, the former Wall Street trader first predicted the price of bitcoin would surpass the $200,000 mark in 2021 back in January of that year, in an interview with Stansberry Research, in which he said he expects BTC to surge to the point its market capitalization will be above $4 trillion. At the time, Keiser said, “we are going to catch up with gold.”

Keiser’s prediction was based on inflation, believing “fiat money around the world is in a hyperinflationary collapse” against BTC. Inflation, it’s worth noting, is the decline of the purchasing power of a currency over time.

A small level of inflation is seen as positive for the economy as it promotes spending to a certain extent over saving, nurturing economic growth. If inflation grows too much and goes out of control, it’s described as hyperinflation which can cause a surge in the price of basic goods such as fuel and food.

Keiser is a well-known bitcoin bull who has earlier argued that bitcoin’s market capitalization could surpass $300 trillion in the future, predicting the flagship cryptocurrency could surpass the U.S. dollar and become the world’s reserve currency.

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