Billionaire Mike Novogratz echoed what I have often said: institutional investors are lining up to get into crypto in 2019.
“There’s going to be a case of institutional FOMO [fear of missing out], just like there was in retail,” he said.
“Bitcoin has to take out $6,800, and after that we could end the year at $8,800-9,000,” he clarified. “After that, though, it’s off to the races for Bitcoin.”
“By the end of the first quarter we will take out $10,000 and after that we will go back to new highs — to $20,000 or more,” Novogratz speculated.
Now, Novogratz isn’t new to the speculation game, and I’m very skeptical of anyone who claims to have a crystal ball. That being said, his $50,000 / BTC prediction in 2017 helped to kick off a wave of bullish sentiment that eventually became a tsunami.
I’d love to entertain Mr.Novogratz and his clairvoyance, but we need to constantly underestimate this market if we are to stay sane and profitable long term. On the other side, you have analysts claiming that the bear market will last another 18 months.
Someone is going to be wrong.
After all, how many times this year have you heard that the market was “due for a recovery”?
Stay skeptical. We’ll get to where we’re going eventually, but don’t buy into narrative that claims that the “price will be this by then”, either to the positive or negative.
Instead, plan for both and try your best to see what others aren’t. In such a thin market, it’s easy for investors to let their emotions cloud their judgement and perception, something that you can capitalize on.
For example, crypto scams are now among the SEC’s top enforcement priorities. Their recent annual report revealed how digital currency scams have their top priority, something we wouldn’t have seen two years ago.
In particular, the SEC is focused on ICOs — many have failed to deliver on their promises or turned out to be outright scams.
So what’s the implication here?
The knee-jerk reaction is to assume this is bad for the space. How can crypto grow if governments of the world are acting against it?
Instead, see this for what it really is: The SEC is legitimizing this space in many ways.
They understand that what is a trickle now will be a flood tomorrow. They understand what is a interesting and unique space now will be a thriving industry tomorrow.
They understand that to enable and encourage the growth of cryptocurrency and distributed ledger technology as a whole, especially in the US, they need to embrace it without limiting it.
Are they going after the top projects in the space? Are they limiting the growth of Bitcoin or Ethereum? Are they unfairly placing restrictions on what can and cannot be developed?
No, they are helping this space by artificially removing the bad actors.
For every Bitconnect that self-implodes, there is another scam that can withstand the tribulation.
Without the actions of agencies like the SEC, valuations would be much more speculative and projects more fruitless.
After all, 2017 showed us what happens when speculation gets out of control. 2018 showed us what happens when that speculation is replaced with utility and reality. 2019 will show us what the combination of utility and regulation can really do.
In essence, the best years of this space are yet to come.
It’s hard to know when the “golden years” are when you’re living in them, but what I thought about over and over again during the Vegas conference is how I will look back ten years from now at these years.
As I said earlier, it’s best to underestimate.