"Many parties have made predictions about BTC, I hope this one is correct."
Shortly after reaching $42,358 on December 17th yesterday, cryptocurrency king Bitcoin (BTC) unfortunately could not hold on to its position as the price plunged back below $41,100.
However, Jan van Eck, VanEck's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is optimistic about the future of BTC where he predicts its price will reach a new all-time high within the next 12 months.
There is no denying that BTC has faced various challenges and doubts, but the digital asset is still emerging as a solid store of value just like gold, so its price is expected to rise high in the future plus there is a halving event in April 2024.
Van Eck, who also emphasized the widespread use of crypto with an estimated user base of around 50 million, underlined BTC's dominant position in the internet-based store of value market as a strong player that is unlikely to overtake emerging alternatives.
The macroeconomic landscape especially interest rates play an important role in the performance of BTC and gold, commented Van Eck, adding that the price of BTC can be bullish when interest rates decline.
The VanEck CEO also provided a series of predictions for the crypto market in 2024 where he expected a recession in the United States (US) when spot BTC ETFs were approved for the first time which subsequently inflowed over $2.4 billion in the first quarter and boosted BTC.
While ETH is not expected to overtake BTC in market share, it is predicted to beat major tech stocks and see its market share challenged by other smart contract platforms.
As of this writing, the price of BTC trading at $41,044 is still down 2.40% in the last 24 hours with a market cap of $803 billion down 5.19% over the last week.