Bitcoin Could Reach $1 Million, ‘Going to Infinity,’ Says Leading Crypto CEO

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Bitcoin could reach $1 million in the next decade, Jesse Powell, CEO of crypto exchange platform Kraken, told Bloomberg yesterday.

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“We can only speculate, but when you measure it in terms of dollars, you have to think it’s going to infinity,” Powell told Bloomberg in an interview. “The true believers will tell you that it’s going all the way to the moon, to Mars and eventually, will be the world’s currency.”

Powell said that the dollar, which “is only 50 years old,” is “already showing extreme signs of weakness, and I think pretty soon people are going to start measuring the price of things in terms of Bitcoin.”

“We won’t be measuring the price of Bitcoin in terms of dollars but in terms of what else you’ll be buying with it, probably planets in other solar systems,” he said.

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Asked about putting a number on it, he told Bloomberg that Bitcoin believers see Bitcoin replacing all the world’s currencies. “In the near term people see it surpassing gold as a store of value. I think $1 million as a price target within the next 10 years is very reasonable,” he added.

Bitcoin was up over 400% year to date last week, Kraken tweeted.

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CoinMarketCap valued the crypto at around $1 trillion last month, a huge milestone. Bitcoin has added more than $415 billion of value in 2021 alone, Bloomberg reports.

The interest in Bitcoin is quickly accelerating and going mainstream. Earlier this week, Goldman Sachs said it was restarting its cryptocurrency trading desk amid increased institutional interest in Bitcoin and the crypto’s meteoric ascent of late.

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The bank will begin dealing Bitcoin futures and non-deliverable forwards for clients beginning next week, Reuters reported, citing a person familiar with the matter and adding that the team will sit within the bank’s global markets division.

Bitcoin broke the $50,000 ceiling last month.

Coinbase’s direct listing is ‘an Amazon moment for crypto,’ and will bring cryptocurrency further into mainstream finance, D.A. Davidson says

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Coinbase Founder and CEO Brian Armstrong Steven Ferdman/Getty Images

Coinbase’s upcoming direct listing will be an “Amazon moment” for cryptocurrencies, according to D.A. Davidson.

The firm initiated coverage of the crypto exchange with a “buy” rating and $195 price target.

D.A. Davidson said the public debut will be a milestone for the convergence of cryptocurrency and traditional finance.

Coinbase’s upcoming direct listing will be a milestone event, marking the covergence of cryptocurrency and traditional finance, according to a team of D.A. Davidson analysts.

In a recent note D.A. Davidson initiated coverage of the cryptocurrency exchange with a “buy” rating and a price target of $195. Analysts led by Gil Luria said Coinbase’s public debut will be the “Amazon moment for crypto,” as cryptocurrency will move from “a large curiosity to becoming the future path for much of the financial system.”

Coinbase will be the first major cryptocurrency exchange to go public. According to the analysts, the exchange’s superior user experience has positioned it as the “leader” in facilitating the onramp/off-ramp from government currency (like dollars) in crypto (like bitcoin.)

“With a big target on its back as a crypto wallet, (to date) Coinbase has been able to manage both government regulators as well as highly motivated hackers, while providing consumers with the experience they expect from a large financial institution,” the analysts added.

As both an exchange and broker, Coinbase’s competition includes Grayscale, Kraken, and Gemini, as well as broader consumer digital wallets like Square, PayPal, and Robinhood, said D.A.Davidson.

The firm’s $195 price target is based on 2021 revenue estimates, but the firm has not been able to connect with Coinbase during its quiet period. Revenue in 2020 was $1.28 billion, a jump from $553.7 million in 2019, according to a consolidated operations statement included in Coinbase’s filings.

For the year ended December 31, 2020, transaction revenue represented over 96% of net revenue. Bitcoin has soared 68% in 2021 and it’s unclear how that affects revenue estimates.

D.A. Davidson noted Coinbase is a more speculative investment than other companies it covers. They also noted the unusually high risks associated with the volatility of crypto prices, and said it’s too early to tell if Coinbase will actually become the Amazon of crypto or the Netscape.

More than 1 in 3 cryptocurrency investors know little to nothing about it, survey finds

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With bitcoin continuing to make headlines as it breaks through price barriers, more new investors are drawn to cryptocurrency every day. But crypto newbies aren’t doing much research before jumping in feet-first, a recent report from Cardify finds.

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Using survey data collected from 750 investors between Feb. 5 and Feb. 12 — a stretch during which the price of one bitcoin climbed from $37,000 to $47,000 — Cardify finds that only 16.9% of investors who have bought crypto “fully understand” the value and potential of cryptocurrency, while 33.5% of buyers have either zero knowledge about the space or would call their level of understanding “emerging.”

A lack of knowledge or understanding hasn’t stopped people from buying virtual currencies, though. More than 40% of all crypto purchases come from new investors, the survey finds. That’s fueled in part by growing mainstream acceptance of crypto. In the past few months, both PayPal and Square added it to their platforms.

The survey results also suggest that many new investors have been spurred into action by a fear of missing out on gains. More than a third of survey respondents researched digital currencies for less than a month before buying, and 1 in 4 cryptocurrency holders told Cardify they were entering the space in the hopes of earning short-term financial gains.

Investment volumes in January 2021 were 23 times higher than they were in 2019, according to Cardify, with the average purchase size growing to $1,212, compared to just $432 at the same point in 2020. Withdrawals — or selling crypto assets — made up 26.8% of transactions, a drop from the 43.1% they represented in 2019 when one bitcoin was worth just over $3,000.

But it wasn’t just bitcoin’s meteoric rise that drew new investors to crypto — high-profile endorsements also played a role. Of the 750 investors surveyed, just under 180 say that they have a more favorable view of Dogecoin and are more likely to put their money into it thanks to Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s many tweets about it to his 48 million followers.

Indeed, Musk’s enthusiasm for the meme-based currency helped make it it the third-most popular crypto among survey respondents, with 8% saying they hold it. Bitcoin and ethereum, with their combined market caps well over $1 trillion, are still the most popular by far.

Investors aren’t completely confident in crypto, however. More than half of the investors surveyed agree that their biggest concern is losing their money due to financial volatility.

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