Bitcoin Slumps Below $94K, but One Analyst Says $500K Forecast Remains in Play

The desultory price action in crypto continued on Tuesday, helping to drag bitcoin (BTC) closer to its lowest level in several months.

In early afternoon trading hours, bitcoin was trading at $93,600, lower by 2% over the past 24 hours and off 10% over the past week.

The broader crypto market as defined by the CoinDesk 20 Index was down 4% over the past 24 hours. Hitting that index was a 16% decline in solana (SOL), which is feeling the pain as the memecoin market may finally have reached peak grift and/or outright criminality over the weekend with the rugpull involving Argentine President Javier Millei. Solana is now down 35% over the past month and has given back all of its post-Trump election gains.

$500K still in play

Standard Chartered’s Geoff Kendrick has previously said he expects bitcoin to eclipse $500,000 by the time Donald Trump leaves office.

Looking past the lame short-term price action, Kendrick — in a morning note on Tuesday — said the recent slate of 13F filings regarding institutional ownership of spot bitcoin ETFs gave him hope.

The type of buyer has evolved from retail to hedge funds and now to banks and sovereigns, said Kendrick, noting a boosted ETF stake from the likes of Goldman Sachs and the initial purchase of a bitcoin ETF by Abu Dhabi.

Kendrick: “Going forward, we would expect more very long-term-long-only money to buy bitcoin and would expect the Abu Dhabi position to be the start of much greater participation by sovereigns.”