Growth to $ 500,000 or loss of leadership. What will happen to bitcoin by 2140
The number of mined BTC exceeded 18.5 million out of 21 million possible. It will take over a century to get the rest. During this time, mining can change significantly, and the first cryptocurrency can give way to altcoins or be destroyed by a supercomputer.
The amount of mined bitcoins exceeded 18 million coins. It remains for miners to receive another 2.5 million BTC as a reward, and then the entire emission of the coin will go into circulation. Moreover, half of this amount will be produced in the next 4 years. It is predicted that it will take about 116 more years to mine the second half, and by 2140 all 21 million BTC will be in the hands of the holders.
The bitcoin mining speed will gradually decrease. This effect is achieved through halving. Once every four years, the reward for mining cryptocurrency falls by half, for example, in May it dropped from 12.5 to 6.25 BTC. In 2024, there will be another decrease in remuneration - from 6.25 to 3.125 BTC.
BTC price rise to $ 500,000 and above
Halving is the most common argument expressed by industry representatives in favor of the future rise in bitcoin prices. If demand for it continues, its price should increase due to a decrease in the growth rate of supply. For this and other reasons, the BTC rate may rise to $ 100,000 by 2021, Anthony Pompliano, co-founder of the investment company Morgan Creek Digital, announced this forecast in April.
The first crypto billionaires and founders of the Gemini exchange Winklevoss Brothers set an even higher target for the price of BTC - $ 500,000. They did not name the timeframe, but gave reasons for the rise in price: the first cryptocurrency will gradually take the position of defensive assets, such as gold and the dollar, since they have significant disadvantages.
Raul Pal, CEO of Real Vision, also announced a possible rise in the price of BTC to $ 1 million. He expects 9000% growth over 5 years.
The founder of the STASIS stable cryptocurrency platform, Grigory Klumov, allowed the price of bitcoin to rise to $ 500,000. The price can rise to this level if all people with assets over $ 100,000 (there are about 550 million people) invest a few percent of their capital in the first cryptocurrency. This scenario is “highly probable”, as no other assets with a projected inflation curve are visible on the investment horizon.
After all the coins have been mined, bitcoin can become one of the defensive assets and even more valuable than gold, suggested Nikita Zuborev, senior analyst at Bestchange.ru. He noted that limited emissions with regular halvings would gradually create a natural scarcity of the coin. Against the background of increasing interest and acceptance of cryptocurrencies in society, this will lead to a rise in the price of BTC by several orders of magnitude higher than today's price.
This effect can be amplified by the lost bitcoins, Zuborev added. According to various estimates, only about a third of all previously mined coins are involved in circulation. Access to the rest was most likely lost for various reasons.
The co-founder of EXANTE Anatoly Knyazev is also positive about the future of BTC. He explained that humanity will not be able to create more bitcoins than the algorithm allows to meet demand. Accordingly, the more the number of users becomes, the more it will contribute to the growth of the cryptocurrency rate.
“Today, the mined coins are divided between about 200 million people. As this number grows, the average rate of the coin also grows. For example, if coverage is 6 billion people, this means an increase of 30 times, up to $ 300,000. However, this is an estimate of a realistic level, while in reality the price may fluctuate greatly, and not smoothly grow as coverage grows, "said Knyazev.
He noted that there is now an excellent fundamental basis for the growth of the value of the main digital asset. There are several reasons for this.
Banks continue the policy of "printing money" and take new steps to depreciate currencies.
Bitcoin passed the third halving, but miners did not leave the market, faced with a decrease in reward for finding a block. This confirms the belief in the coin's prospects.
The capitalization of bitcoin is tens of times higher than projects even from the TOP-10 of the cryptocurrency market.
Bitcoin has the highest recognition among cryptocurrencies, in case of a trend change to an upward one, it will again attract retail investors.
What threatens Bitcoin
Belief in the multiple growth of the bitcoin rate is not enough to make an informed decision about investing in a coin for a period of 100 years. There are many threats that can negatively impact the future of a major digital asset.
For example, competition from other technologies. Already, bitcoin is losing to many altcoins in technical terms. The speed of operations in the BTC network is 4-7 transactions per second. This is significantly lower than other more modern coins such as Ethereum and XRP. In addition to this, the first cryptocurrency does not support smart contracts for deploying applications, which also limits the demand for it.
Another threat to BTC - created