Overall, ARK Invest argues that Bitcoin has "significant appreciation potential" — and that its total market cap could scale by 25x over the next decade.
A single Bitcoin could be worth $1.36 million by 2030, according to a bullish new report by ARK Invest.
The ambitious figure is based on a number of assumptions, including:
- Bitcoin being used for 50% of global remittances by the end of the decade
- BTC accounting for 25% of U.S. bank settlement volumes
- 1% of the wealth held by nation-state treasuries being allocated to BTC
- 2.55% of institutional assets being allocated to BTC
- S&P 500 companies holding 5% of their cash in BTC
- BTC reaching 50% of gold's total market capitalization
Overall, ARK Invest argues that Bitcoin has "significant appreciation potential" — and that its total market cap could scale by 25x over the next decade.
At the time the report was being prepared, BTC had a market cap of $1.1 trillion — compared with $10 trillion for gold and $106 trillion for global equities.
ARK Invest also points to charts that indicate Bitcoin holders are focused on long-term fundamentals — with more than 500,000 addresses holding on to the digital asset despite its volatility. Collectively, they own 13.5 million BTC, accounting for the vast amount of the 19 million BTC in circulation.
Overall, transfer volumes in 2021 increased by 463% too — hitting $13.1 trillion. As a result, the organization says that annual settlement volumes have now surpassed Visa. ARK points to the successful Taproot upgrade, the continued growth of the Lightning Network and the arrival of Wrapped Bitcoin as proof that Bitcoin can continue to scale in response to technological breakthroughs.
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What about BTC's Sustainability?
The report is incredibly enthusiastic about Bitcoin's potential, adding:
"Our research suggests that Bitcoin has the potential to transform monetary history by providing financial freedom and empowerment in a fair, global, and distributed way."
And although digital assets like BTC have come in for criticism because of their energy-intensive Proof-of-Work blockchains, ARK Invest argues these concerns "seem ill-informed."
From an environmental perspective, its analysts say that BTC can actually incentivize more efficient forms of energy generation — and encourage investment in renewables. On a social standpoint, ARK argues that BTC protects "the purchasing power of people in countries with strict capital controls, highly inflationary currencies or capricious governments." And when it comes to governance, they write:
"Bitcoin is open, transparent, auditable, and predictable. Bitcoin has no central point of failure and reduces potential human bias and error."
Led by Cathie Wood, ARK Invest has repeatedly struck a bullish tone on Bitcoin — and argued that it can hit $500,000 by 2025 if institutional investors continue to gain exposure to this asset. However, with the exception of MicroStrategy and Tesla, few big names have actually taken the plunge so far.
In response to Bitcoin's recent slump, Wood also declared that the "strike against technology, growth and innovation" will be temporary.
