Bitcoin is now attracting the attention of the world’s wealthiest investors. Here’s why.
After trading down or sideways for much of the past seven months, Bitcoin (BTC 0.94%) may finally be ready for a major breakout. The investment firm Bernstein has just released a report detailing all the reasons it thinks Bitcoin could hit a new all-time high of $200,000 by the end of 2025.
Based on Bitcoin’s current price of about $68,000, that would represent nearly a 200% gain. As a result, billionaire investors appear to be rushing to buy the cryptocurrency right now. The most notable of these include hedge fund managers and tech entrepreneurs, and all seem to believe that Bitcoin is poised for a major rally after the 2024 presidential election. So, could they be right?
Which billionaires are buying Bitcoin?
Michael Saylor, executive chairman of MicroStrategy (MSTR -0.66%), is arguably the most prominent of the billionaire bulls. At a Bitcoin conference in Nashville, Tennessee, this past summer, he predicted that the digital coin could hit a price of $13 million by the year 2045. And he continues to buy aggressively for MicroStrategy, to the point where the company now holds more than 1% of all Bitcoin in the world.
Other tech billionaires are also jumping into Bitcoin, including Mark Cuban and Jack Dorsey, head of Block. So are top Silicon Valley venture capitalists, some of whom are now getting involved in the 2024 presidential election. As a sign of their bullish outlook for crypto, Dorsey recently predicted that the crypto could hit a price of $1 million by 2030.
Lastly, there are the billionaire hedge fund managers who are loading up on the new spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Based on 13F data from the Securities and Exchange Commission, it’s possible to piece together which funds are buying it, as well as how much they own.
One of the biggest names to watch is Millennium Management, led by the billionaire Israel Englander, who loaded up on $2 billion worth of Bitcoin ETFs at the start of the year. All told, there are now more than 600 investment firms that have significant holdings of the Bitcoin ETFs.
Why are billionaires buying Bitcoin?
Based on the above, it might be easy to conclude that these billionaires are primarily buying Bitcoin because they expect its price to increase significantly over the short run. In the crypto industry, this is known as “Number Go Up.” You buy Bitcoin because you hope that its price will go up, and you don’t worry about why.
But that is likely painting too simplistic a picture of billionaire buying activity. As part of its $200,000 price prediction for Bitcoin, Bernstein laid out a number of compelling reasons to buy it.
Image source: Getty Images.
The first is what Bernstein refers to as “a new institutional era” for Bitcoin. This includes wide-scale buy-in from institutional investors, which now view the crypto as a stand-alone asset class. And it also includes the launch of the new spot Bitcoin ETFs.
As Bernstein sees it, this new institutional era means that Wall Street institutions and billionaire investors are going to become the largest holders of Bitcoin. With all of that new money pouring into Bitcoin, the price is likely to soar.
A second factor is the growing realization that Bitcoin can serve as a hedge against uncertainty. If you are concerned about hyperinflation, you buy Bitcoin. If you are concerned about the U.S. government’s $35 trillion debt load, you buy Bitcoin. If you are concerned about geopolitical tension in the Middle East, you buy Bitcoin.
So, for example, JPMorgan Chase (JPM -1.19%) has been talking up something that it refers to as the “debasement trade.” This refers primarily to the debasement of the U.S. dollar, as well as growing instability in the world. To hedge your risk, you move your money into Bitcoin and other assets perceived to be more stable. In a recent report, JPMorgan Chase suggests that this debasement trade will continue into 2025, pushing up the price of both gold and Bitcoin.
How to think like a billionaire investor
Of course, you shouldn’t buy Bitcoin just because wealthy billionaires are doing so. But you should certainly learn to think like a billionaire. Instead of relying on the simplistic “Number Go Up” argument, you can build out a much more sophisticated case for why you should be buying the crypto.
From my perspective, the appealing thing about Bitcoin is that it can function as both a “risk on” and a “risk off” asset. In other words, Bitcoin can flourish when bull-market sentiment prevails, but also offer protection in down markets. For that reason, I’m bullish on Bitcoin heading into 2025. By the end of next year, we might be talking about a digital asset that is trading near the $200,000 level.
JPMorgan Chase is an advertising partner of The Ascent, a Motley Fool company. Dominic Basulto has positions in Bitcoin. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Bitcoin and JPMorgan Chase. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.