Bitwise CIO: Bitcoin could reach $1 million in the long term, with its potential stemming from its "digital gold" positioning

Odaily Planet Daily reports that Matt Hougan, Chief Investment Officer of Bitwise, stated that the price of Bitcoin could potentially reach $1 million per coin in the future. He believes that from the perspective of the global “store of value” market, Bitcoin’s long-term potential will become clearer as it gradually competes with gold for the position of digital store of value assets.

In his latest memo titled “How Bitcoin Gets to $1 Million,” Hougan pointed out that the current global store of value market is approximately $38 trillion, with about $36 trillion coming from gold, and Bitcoin accounting for around $1.4 trillion, less than 4% of the market.

Hougan believes that many investors underestimate Bitcoin’s potential because they overlook the growth rate of the store of value market itself. For example, when the first gold ETF was launched in the US in 2004, the global gold market was only about $2.5 trillion. Today, it has approached $40 trillion, with a compound annual growth rate of about 13%. This growth has been mainly driven by increasing government debt, geopolitical uncertainties, and loose monetary policies.

If the store of value market continues to expand at a similar rate over the next decade, its size could reach approximately $121 trillion. In this scenario, Bitcoin would only need to capture about 17% of the market share for its price to reach $1 million.

Hougan also pointed out that recent developments in the crypto market have laid the foundation for this outlook. For example, a few years ago, there was no Bitcoin spot ETF in the US, but now Bitcoin spot ETFs have become one of the fastest-growing ETF products in history. Meanwhile, institutional investors, including Harvard University’s endowment fund and Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund, have also begun allocating to Bitcoin.