Bitwise CIO: Bitcoin could reach $1 million in the long term; its potential stems from its "digital gold" positioning.

Matt Hougan, Chief Investment Officer at Bitwise, stated that the price of Bitcoin could potentially reach $1 million per coin in the future. He believes that Bitcoin's long-term potential becomes clearer when viewed from the perspective of the global "Store of Value" market, as it gradually competes with gold for the status of digital store of value assets. In his latest memo titled "How Bitcoin Gets to $1 Million," Hougan points out that the current global store of value market is approximately $38 trillion, with about $36 trillion coming from gold, while Bitcoin accounts for about $1.4 trillion, less than 4% of the market. Hougan argues that many investors underestimate Bitcoin's potential by ignoring 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 is close to $40 trillion, with a compound annual growth rate of about 13%. This growth is primarily driven by increasing government debt, geopolitical uncertainty, and loose monetary policy. If the store of value market continues to expand at a similar pace over the next decade, its size could reach approximately $121 trillion. In this scenario, Bitcoin only needs to capture about 17% of the market share to reach a price of $1 million. Hougan also points out that the development of the crypto market in recent years has laid the foundation for this prospect. For example, a few years ago there were no Bitcoin spot ETFs in the US, but now Bitcoin spot ETFs have become one of the fastest-growing ETF products in history. At the same time, institutional investors, including the Harvard University endowment fund and the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund, have also begun to allocate Bitcoin.