Dan Held, growth lead at crypto exchange Kraken, is explaining why he believes Bitcoin’s current bull run could be part of a supercycle that takes the cryptocurrency all the way to $1 million.
In a recent video, the crypto veteran analyzes Bitcoin’s success and rapid price appreciation.
Held points out that Bitcoin’s founder, Satoshi Nakamoto, originally believed Bitcoin’s speculative nature would be the key feature that would help it grow. Held quotes Satoshi and likens the creator’s vision to that of a traditional marketing phenomenon known as the ‘viral feedback loop’ wherein content derives value simply from the number of people interested in it.
“I feel like a lot of people are looking at the market and they’re going, ‘Oh well Bitcoin will just have a typical cycle.’ I think there’s a ton of different reasons why that won’t be the case… Satoshi actually hypothesizes that speculation would lead to Bitcoin’s inception and adoption…
For example, Satoshi says, ‘As the number of users grows, the value per coin increases. It has the potential for a positive feedback loop; as users increase, the value goes up, which could attract more users to take advantage of the increasing value.’ He wrote this before Bitcoin was worth even a penny… We can see this over time. The dotted lines of the halving events and we see these speculative bubbles occur and these we hypothesize are due to a reduction in supply and increase in demand…
In traditional marketing sense, this is called a viral feedback loop… A viral feedback loop is [when] someone discovers a piece of content, let’s say you see a funny dog video that’s associated with a website, and you go to the website to try it out, you find value there and then you share it with your friends…
Satoshi understood this and he brought this into money. He understood that he could create a viral feedback loop on just the price alone. As the price increases, people become more aware of it, and then other people buy in with that expectation of the price going higher and they tell their friends about it.”
The former Uber executive says that the Covid-19 pandemic has provided the perfect macro circumstances for Bitcoin to show its value.
“What’s really unique about this cycle though, and I’ve been around for all the other cycles… this one is very different. Never before has it had such strong fundamentals against a macro backdrop which highlights exactly why it’s needed…
Never before have we seen Dutch GDP ratios like this. Never before have we seen inflation this high. It is truly unprecedented. This is what’s so interesting that folks don’t think that they need Bitcoin until this moment happens when it shakes them out of their reality and they go ‘Oh, I get why Bitcoin’s valuable.’ Just like getting earthquake insurance. Most people don’t think about getting earthquake insurance until an earthquake hits… And Bitcoin is exactly like that, it’s insurance against money and devaluing of money by governments and the lack of trust of banks.”
Held says that institutions finally understand the value of Bitcoin and are entering the market, setting the stage for a super cycle.
“So Covid brought Bitcoin’s focus and value and made it really obvious for the world. And because of that, a new participant entered, the institutions… Institutions post-Covid were searching for a safe store of value. You’ve got $18 trillion of negatively yielding sovereign debt and Bitcoin offers such a greater value than gold… These institutions manage over a $100 trillion…
What’s going to happen in 2021 and 2022 when everywhere you can buy Bitcoin: every bank, every brokerage. All that pent up purchasing and demand for Bitcoin flows into the market. So you get the institutions and retail who are going to flow trillions of dollars into Bitcoin over the next couple of years. And that’s why I think this is a supercycle. What happens when ownership of Bitcoin moves from 0.01% of the world to 1%? A 100x increase. Price will move much more than that.”
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