Billionaire investor Tim Draper, the founder of Draper Associates and one of Silicon Valley-s best-known investors, has doubled down on his $250,000 Bitcoin ($BTC) price prediction, saying the cryptocurrency will hit that mark by June of next year.
According to CNBC, Draper predicted the flagship cryptocurrency will still rise nearly 1,400% in less than a year despite the collapse of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX. Per his words, the $250,000 prediction was extended by six months, as it was originally set for the end of 2022 or early 2023.
FTX’ collapsed after a bank run was triggered on the exchange, leading to it halting withdrawals and revealing it did not have users’ funds. The exchange has filed for bankruptcy last month while its former CEO, Sam Bankman-Fried, has said that he “screwed up” but maintained that he “didn’t ever try to commit fraud”, and was shocked by the collapse of the exchange.
Its collapse affected other cryptocurrency platforms. Lender BlockFi has filed for bankruptcy in the US, citing “significant exposure” to the collapse of cryptocurrency exchange FTX. BlockFi had already halted most activity on its platform and is seeking court protection to restructure, settle its debts, and recover money for investors.
As CNBC reported, last week veteran investor Mark Mobius said BTC could crash to $10,000, a more than 40% drop from the cryptocurrency’s current $17,000 price tag. Mobius has accurately predicted Bitcoin would drop to $20,000 this year.
Draper is, nevertheless, focusing on BTC’s potential rise next year. He said:
I expect a flight to quality and decentralized crypto like bitcoin, and for some of the weaker coins to become relics
Draper’s most successful investments include companies like Tesla, Skype, and Baidu. The billionaire is known in the cryptocurrency space for being a BTC bull that in 2014 acquired for $18.7 million 29,656 bitcoins confiscated by U.S. Marshals from the defunct dark web marketplace The Silk Road. Those same coins are now worth over $500 million.
Back in 2014, when BTC traded between $300 and $600, the billionaire predicted Bitcoin’s price would hit $10,000 in three years. The flagship cryptocurrency came close to the $20,000 in 2017.
Draper believes bitcoin’s price will explode next year as cryptocurrencies still have a largely untapped demographic: women. Per his words, since women “control 80% of retail spending and only 1 in 7 bitcoin wallets are currently held by women, the dam is about to break.”
Draper isn’t the only billionaire bullish on crypto. As CryptoGlobe reported, billionaire investor Mike Novogratz has revealed that he still believes BTC will trade at $500,000 per coin in the future, but delayed his prediction over the Federal Reserve and other central banks raising interest rates to rein in on inflation.
Novogratz said that he believes $BTC will trade at $500,000 but “not in five years,” as per his words Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell found “his central banking superpowers.”
Per Novogratz FTX’ collapse, along with that of hedge fund Three Arrows Capital and lenders, Celsius Network and BlockFi, certainly hurt “the overall confidence in crypto, but that too shall pass.”
To Draper, mass adoption is coming once retailers see that accepting cryptocurrency payments allows them to save “roughly 2% on every purchase” as payments middlemen such as visa and Mastercard wouldn’t be able to charge their fees on these payments.
Draper also believes that Bitcoin’s upcoming halving event – which will halve coinbase block rewards miners receive – could boost BTC’s price. Bitcoin’s next halving is set to occur in 2024.
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