New All-Time High Birthday Present For Bitcoin
Bitcoin (BTC) has soared to a new all-time high of $34,711.90 on what is the cryptocurrency’s 12th birthday, 3 January, 2021.
Bitcoin’s rally surprised many traders after a correction to around $30,300 yesterday. Within 24 hours, however, it rebounded sharply and was up over 14% to reach its new all-time high earlier today.
The Bitcoin price has since stabilized, but with it being early morning in Europe and the US still to wake up, Bitcoiners could be in for further Bitcoin birthday presents.
Institutional Demand For Bitcoin Is Driving The Price Up
The main catalyst behind Bitcoin’s rally has been the institutional demand for Bitcoin.
The appeal for Bitcoin was well-known by everyone in the space, but with Covid-19 shutting down the global economy, governments desire to print more cash has also reached all-time highs.
This has led many institutional investors to look for an uncollateralised hedge against the dollar and other government shitcoins, especially as interest rates are close to zero in the US and negative in Europe in Japan.
With the US printing more than 20% of the total USD last year alone, the attraction of Bitcoin’s scarcity has seen huge inflows from the institutional world.
MicroStrategy started the tidal wave, when they announced they had put $250 million of its liquid treasury into Bitcoin.
CEO Michael Saylor said at the time that he saw his cash rich treasury as a melting ice cube, and had to look for a safe haven for his company’s heard earned cash.
MicroStrategy has since spent over $1.15 billion on Bitcoin, as it has made the cryptocurrency its main treasury holdings.
Jack Dorsey’s Square Inc. followed with a $50 million Bitcoin purchase, and then in October 2020, PayPal announced its Bitcoin service to its US customers.
Since then, it’s believed that PayPal has been accumulating the bitcoins it needs to cover its users interest, which has dried up much of the supply. Wait until PayPal launches its Bitcoin service globally.
Institutional demand for Bitcoin has only increased since and Guggenheim Investments announced in December that it would be putting up to 10% of its treasury into Bitcoin, as well.
At the time, Guggenheim CIO Scott Minerd said revealed the investment firm believe the true value of Bitcoin is worth around $400,000.
Minerd said his Guggenheim Investments started buying Bitcoin when it was around $10,000, but after researching it more ‘our fundamental work shows that Bitcoin should be worth about $400,000.’
And also last month, 150-year old, Fortune 500 firm MassMutual announced it had allocated $100 million of its liquidity into Bitcoin.
It’s only a small amount for such a large insurance company, but the statement is quite telling when a company whose sole purpose for 150 years is to manage risk is now buying Bitcoin.
Bitcoin Is Coming Of Age In Its 13th Year, But It’s Only Just Getting Going
Bitcoin has been on a tear since crashing to lows of $4574 on 13 March, 2020. Since then it has risen over 600% to today’s all-time high of $34,711.90.
Many investors believe the Bitcoin price is peaking and we are in for a crash. However, many others including Preston Pysh, Dan Held and PlanB believe we are only just getting going.
Looking back at the two previous cycles, it looks like this bull cycle still has lots of legroom, and we shouldn’t peak until at least Q3 this year.
According to PlanB’s Stock-to-Flow (S2FX) model, we should see a price of around $288,000 at the cycle peak. However, with institutional demand for Bitcoin getting more rampant, many believe we are entering a supercycle.
If we are in a supercycle, the Bitcoin price could hit anywhere north of $500,000. Preston Pysh has regularly spoken of Bitcoin breaking the S2FX model to the upside, and Dan Held released a videocast, saying he believes Bitcoin is entering a supercycle.
Whoever is right, I think most people invested in Bitcoin believe the price is going north from here. And with institutional demand for Bitcoin rising, who would bet against a supercycle?
