After false SEC post on ETF, bulls still see bitcoin at all-time highs this year
Representations of cryptocurrency Bitcoin are placed on a PC motherboard in this illustration taken June 16, 2023.
Dado Ruvic | Reuters
St. Moritz, SWITZERLAND — Top players in the crypto industry gathered at a lavish hotel in elegant Swiss ski town St. Moritz ahead of the Wednesday start of the Crypto Finance Conference.
Many were at dinners and drinks when a post from the account of the U.S. Securities and Exchange (SEC) on the X social media platform, formerly known as Twitter, on Tuesday claimed that the long-awaited bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) had been approved.
It turned out it hadn’t. Instead, the SEC said its account had been compromised.
The false news was enough to send bitcoin spiking briefly before falling. It also ruined the celebrations of the crypto industry players in St. Moritz, many of who have been waiting for years for a bitcoin ETF to get past skeptics at the SEC.
“We walked into the lobby bar, right as the tweet came out, and everyone was ecstatic … and then five minutes later after all the drinks were ordered … very sad,” Meltem Demirors, head of strategy at CoinShares, told CNBC on Wednesday.
“But, look, I think if you’re a screenwriter, you couldn’t write the narrative of this industry, it’s wild, its preposterous, its crazy.”
The false post has not dampened the mood among crypto bulls, who say that new bitcoin highs are possible this year.
“I think we are going over six figures by the end of the year,” Demirors said, highlighting two key reasons — a bitcoin ETF approval and the so-called upcoming “halving” event.
Both of these factors underpinned the more than 150% rally in bitcoin of last year — a rise that has continued into 2024.
ETFs excitement
Many are excited about a bitcoin ETF, which tracks the price of the cryptocurrency and allows market participants to invest in bitcoin without actually owning the crypto.
The thought is that an ETF could bring in larger and more traditional investors, who didn’t want to go near cryptocurrency.
“This is a watershed moment, no question about it. It’s going to usher in a lot of institutional capital, it’s going to change the dynamic of this asset class completely,” Sheila Warren, CEO of the Crypto Council for Innovation, told CNBC on Wednesday.
Crypto execs are not expecting that the SEC social media debacle will fully derail the ETF approval.
Fred Thiel, CEO of bitcoin miner Marathon Digital Holdings, told CNBC that the SEC may “delay” approval, but will likely give the green light soon.
“I have a feeling that they’re likely going to approve a whole slew of them and then move on,” Thiel said.
Demirors of CoinShares said that the ETFs could potentially see capital inflows of $25 billion to $100 billion in their first year of trade, coming from various areas, including the trillions of dollars in U.S. retirement funds.
Where does the bitcoin price go in 2024?
The previous all-time high of bitcoin was logged just under $69,000 in November 2021.
The bitcoin price collapsed in 2022, as projects failed, bankruptcies flooded the industry and major players such as the crypto exchange and FTX faced criminal probes in the U.S.
Bitcoin then rose by more than 150% in 2023, with much of that increase owed to excitement around the ETF.
But bitcoin also has historically traded in cycles, which include key events called halvings — when the rewards that miners earn from mining bitcoin are slashed in half. This reduces the amount of bitcoin supply in the market and has often preceded a bull run to all-time highs. There will only ever be 21 million bitcoins in circulation.
The next halving is due to take place in April 2024.
The anticipation over ETF and the halving has caused the crypto industry to get very bullish on bitcoin this year.
“I think bitcoin will either follow its historical cycle, which would have it increase in price, achieve the prior all-time high some time toward the end of this year, then new all-time highs towards the end of next year. That’s if it follows historical patterns,” Thiel said.
Thiel added that potential monetary policy easing from central banks globally could also help support the price of bitcoin.
“We estimate internally that we’ll definitely hit the all-time high levels by the end of this year, the prior all-time highs, and we’ll see into next year what happens beyond that,” Thiel said.
CNBC previously spoke to people, both inside and outside of the cryptocurrency industry, about their price outlook, with calls ranging from $60,000 to $500,000 for bitcoin by the end of 2024.
Lisa Su, CEO of AMD, attends the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit at the Grand Palais in Paris, Feb. 10, 2025.
Benoit Tessier | Reuters
Shares of Advanced Micro Devices slid more than 5% on Wednesday after the company said it could incur charges of up to $800 million for exporting its MI308 products to China and other countries.
“The Company expects to apply for licenses but there is no assurance that licenses will be granted,” AMD said in the filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The new U.S. license requirement, which applies to exports of certain semiconductor products, would hit inventory, purchase commitments and related reserves, AMD said in the filing.
AMD is one of the companies that builds the hardware behind the artificial intelligence boom. The company claims its AMD Instinct MI300 Series accelerators are “uniquely well-suited to power even the most demanding AI and HPC workloads,” according to its website.
It generated a “record” revenue of $25.8 billion in 2025, according to its February earnings release, but the new export restrictions could slow growth.
AMD one month stock chart.
Nvidia, an AMD competitor, released a similar disclosure on Tuesday. The company said it will take a quarterly charge of about $5.5 billion for exporting H20 graphics processing units.
China is Nvidia’s fourth-largest region by sales, after the U.S., Singapore, and Taiwan, according to the company’s annual report. More than half of its sales went to U.S. companies in its fiscal year that ended in January.
–CNBC’s Kif Leswing and Jordan Novet contributed to this report.
-
Sports2 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports1 year agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business3 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway