Bitwise Raises Its Long-Term Bitcoin Price Outlook — Even With the Market in Turmoil
It’s not often that an asset manager takes a bigger, bolder long-term bet on Bitcoin in the middle of a punishing drawdown. But that’s exactly what Bitwise Asset Management has done. Matt Hougan, the firm’s chief investment officer, openly admitted that he started the internal review process expecting to slash the company’s ambitious forecast. With sentiment bruised, inflation still running hot, interest rates elevated, the Middle East in conflict, and the tech world increasingly haunted by fears of an AI bubble, the safe move would have been to lower expectations. Instead, the numbers pushed in another direction. Bitwise raised its long-term BTC price target, and the reasoning comes down to two things: the size of the markets Bitcoin can reach, and how much of those markets it can realistically claim.
The first half of that equation is all about scope. Bitwise substantially rebuilt its estimates for the total addressable markets that Bitcoin could one day serve. A decade from now, the asset manager now believes the global store-of-value market will be worth $110 trillion, up sharply from the $91 trillion it had previously projected. That increase is tied to a growing sense among global investors that fiat currencies are quietly losing purchasing power — and that the erosion won’t reverse anytime soon. Inflation, debt accumulation, and monetary expansion have all contributed to what Hougan describes as a rising tide of fiat debasement. At the same time, Bitwise also raised its estimate for the institutional investment market, lifting that figure from $216 trillion to $303 trillion. And that’s not all. Other potential opportunity areas, including offshore wealth and emerging market currencies, also saw their projected totals expand. For anyone following Bitcoin’s long-term thesis, this is significant: a larger market means a larger potential ceiling for the asset’s price if it captures a meaningful share of that opportunity.
The second factor is Bitcoin’s ability to take share — and here, recent developments are starting to look more favorable. Hougan pointed to a number of concrete signals that suggest the asset is becoming more embedded in mainstream finance, not less. Major wealth management platforms like Wells Fargo and Merrill Lynch have moved toward Bitcoin rather than distancing themselves from it, a sign that traditional financial advisors are increasingly treating it as a legitimate client conversation. Central banks and sovereign wealth funds, once viewed as deeply skeptical of digital assets, have also inched closer to the space. Maybe just as importantly, Bitcoin’s cyclical volatility has kept declining. That matters because it addresses one of the most enduring criticisms of the asset: that it’s simply too volatile to serve as a reliable store of value. Even as Bitwise raised its addressable market assumptions, however, Hougan stressed that the firm held its market share estimates unchanged from the prior year. The decision to keep those assumptions intact was deliberate. It means the firm’s updated price target is not based on increasingly aggressive adoption predictions, but on a larger underlying opportunity.
Of course, the bear case is easy to construct right now, and Hougan was not shy about acknowledging it. Most of the capital flowing into store-of-value assets this cycle has gone to gold, not Bitcoin. For all the talk of digital gold, it’s the actual gold that continues to attract the largest share of crisis money. Bitcoin’s latest downturn once again exposed its vulnerability to sharp, painful losses, and the once-frenzied pace of spot ETF inflows has slowed considerably from its early peak. On the surface, that would seem to justify lowering the forecast — perhaps dramatically so. But Hougan argues that a closer look at the data reveals a different story. During the recent drawdown, Bitcoin’s correlation with gold actually increased, a sign that investors are beginning to treat it more like a macroeconomic hedge and less like a tech stock. The 53% peak-to-trough decline was severe, yes, but it was shallower than previous bear markets, where losses of 80% or more were not unusual. Even more telling, institutional investors continued adding exposure throughout the downturn, despite the apparent slowdown in ETF purchases. In other words, the flow data that grabbed headlines did not tell the whole story.
Taken together, those signals suggest that Bitcoin is maturing in ways that are easy to miss in the daily noise of price charts and liquidation data. Perhaps the clearest illustration of that transformation sits in Bitcoin’s share of the store-of-value market. A decade ago, that share was effectively negligible — less than 1%. Today, Bitwise estimates it has grown to more than 5%. That may not sound dramatic at first, but it represents a fundamental shift in how a generation of investors and institutions view the asset. Bitcoin is no longer just a speculative experiment for retail traders and early adopters; it’s becoming a permanent part of the financial landscape, and it’s competing with established asset classes like gold on a global scale. The fact that this expansion comes during a time of negative sentiment, regulatory pressure, and difficult macro conditions makes it even more remarkable. It suggests the move into Bitcoin is not merely a trend, but a structural adjustment.
Looking ahead, Bitwise’s decision to hold its market share assumptions steady while raising the total market estimates may actually be the most interesting detail. It signals that the updated price target could still be conservative. If Bitcoin continues to gain share of wealth management portfolios, if central banks hold it as reserve assets, or if the next decade brings clearer regulatory clarity, the assumptions themselves will likely need to be revised upward — meaning the price forecast could rise again. That may come as a relief to long-term holders who have weathered months of discouraging headlines. But it also serves as a reminder that the road to the next cycle will not be straight. Volatility, drawdowns, and competing narratives will continue to shape the journey. The key takeaway from Hougan’s updated analysis is that Bitcoin’s long-term outlook has not merely survived the recent turbulence. It has emerged stronger, backed by larger estimates of the market it can serve and increasingly resilient adoption patterns. For now, Bitwise’s revised forecast stands as a clear signal that the biggest players in asset management still believe the Bitcoin story is only beginning.
