Tim Draper, a venture entrepreneur, predicts that despite a rough year for the cryptocurrency defined by business failures and plummeting prices, bitcoin will surpass $250,000 a token by mid-2023.
Bitcoin is known as the most prominent cryptocurrency worldwide.
Draper had forecast that the bitcoin price would reach $250,000 by the end of 2022. But then, he revised his prediction to June 2023 at the Web Summit technology conference in Lisbon in early November.
2023 Forecast
In response to a question about how he felt about his price prediction after FTX's fall, he reiterated this stance on Saturday, Dec. 3.
Through an email exchange with CNBC, Draper stated, "I have extended my prediction by six months. $250k is still my number."
The weaker currencies will go away, he told CNBC, and people would flock to the more secure and decentralized ones, like bitcoin.
Draper's forecast would only come true if the price of bitcoin increased by almost 1,400% from its present level of approximately $17,000.
Note that since the beginning of the year, the value of the crypto has dropped by more than 60%.
Price pressures on digital currencies are high due to the Fed's tightening monetary policy and the failure of many large industrial businesses, such as Terra, Celsius, and FTX.
The collapse of FTX has exacerbated a widespread liquidity problem in the business world. One of the companies claimed to be affected by FTX's bankruptcy is crypto exchange Gemini, while another is crypto lender Genesis.
On the other hand, venture investor and Palantir software co-founder Joe Lonsdale recently spoke with Fox News and predicted that more crypto firms would fail in a "Ponzi-like" way. He added that cryptocurrencies would remain an important international money exchange instrument.
Related Story: Palantir Co-founder Says Crypto Market Will Continue to Crash Due to Ponzi Schemes
The Rationale
Going back to Draper's prediction, he believes next year will be the breakthrough year for bitcoin since there is still a vast untapped population for bitcoin, which consists of women.
Women are underrepresented in crypto. A poll by Momentive for CNBC and Acorns found that twice as many men as women engage in digital assets (16% vs. 7%).
Draper said retailers would save 2% on bitcoin purchases than with dollars. Bitcoin will be everywhere once merchants know 2% can boost revenues.
Visa and Mastercard charge up to 2% for each credit card transaction. Bitcoin eliminates intermediaries.
Nevertheless, digital coins are unstable and not commonly acknowledged as cash, making daily spending difficult.
Draper's Investments
Draper is one of Silicon Valley's most prominent financiers; he established Draper Associates. His investments in Tesla, Skype, and Baidu all paid well.
In 2014, he anticipated that Bitcoin's price would reach $10,000 in three years. Then in 2017, Bitcoin's price increased to over $20,000.
Not all of Draper's investments have been successful. He put money into Theranos, a new medical company that fabricated claims about being able to diagnose illnesses from blood samples. The creator of Theranos, Elizabeth Holmes, was given 11 years in jail for fraud.
See More: CryptoWatch: Binance's Proof of Reserves for BTC, FTX's Former CEO Apologizes, and Genesis' Debt
