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Cryptocurrency bulls say bitcoin could surge to more than $100,000 this year after the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission made a pivotal step to approve the first-ever U.S. spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund.

Several crypto investors CNBC spoke with said they see the world’s top cryptocurrency rising in 2024, as the effects of approval of a bitcoin ETF, which would diversify the range of investors that can gain exposure to the cryptocurrency, begin to become more apparent.

Bitcoin’s price hasn’t moved a great deal since the news of the SEC ETF approval came in, which saw the agency give 11 products the green light.

The regulator approved rule changes to allow the creation of the ETFs, but stressed that this move “should in no way signal the Commission’s willingness to approve listing standards for crypto asset securities.”

Prices reacted to that substantially since the SEC’s move Wednesday. Bitcoin’s price was trading at $46,118 apiece Friday, down around 0.4%.

It briefly topped $49,000 to levels not seen since December 2021.

Over time, though, ETFs, coupled with other developments in the crypto world, are expected to drive major upward movements in bitcoin.

What’s a bitcoin ETF?

ETFs allow more retail investors to hold bitcoin indirectly via a share traded on a stock exchange. Investors expect acceptance of the token could begin to become more mainstream with more and more institutions like BlackRock, Fidelity, and others offering these products.

Anthony Scaramucci, founder of SkyBridge Capital, said he’s been increasing his exposure to bitcoin, ethereum, solana and other cryptocurrencies over the past year.

Scaramucci says 2023 was best year for his crypto funds, will buy bitcoin ETF

“I think this is a really big breakthrough for bitcoin as a digital asset, it’s a much broader story for digital property in general,” Scaramucci told CNBC’s Arjun Kharpal at the CfC conference in St Moritz.
“I think bitcoin will probably see its all-time high at the end of the year, and is likely to go through its all-time high by the end of the year.”

As for what price Scaramucci expects for bitcoin, the noted investor said he sees the cryptocurrency hitting $100,000 over the next year.

“Could bitcoin be $100,000, which is more or a little bit more than a double over the next year? I do believe that.”

But he made a caveat: “I have been wrong so many times before.”

‘Digital gold’

He compared the token’s ETF approval to the 2004 green lighting of the first spot gold ETF. That development took years to translate into major price gains, but gold eventually skyrocketed in value.

The precious metal is now worth around $1,592.76, up around 556% since 2004 when the SPDR Gold Shares ETF began trading. Crypto bulls expect a similar direction of travel for bitcoin — except it’ll be much quicker this time around.

“We see it as digital gold,” Scaramucci told CNBC. “If you look at the market cap of gold, $13 trillion, there’s no reason why bitcoin couldn’t be 50% or 60% of that market capitalization. So that implies a 10x price over then next decade.”

Many crypto investors have compared bitcoin with gold in the past. But it’s worth noting that, while backers believe they have similar qualities — like a finite supply and immunity to external economic and geopolitical headwinds — bitcoin hasn’t exactly passed the mark as “digital gold.”

Past price performance over the past few years has shown bitcoin trades in correlation with stocks, in particular the tech-heavy Nasdaq, rather than gold.

Bitcoin did massively outperform the Nasdaq in 2023, many other risk-assets, and gold in 2023.

But the cryptocurrency primarily got a boost from speculation that the Federal Reserve would dial back its aggressive interest rate rises, which would be supportive for risk assets like cryptocurrencies.

Vijay Ayyar, vice president of international for Indian crypto exchange CoinDCX, said ETF approvals had been “priced in for some time now.”

Bitcoin’s already gone from about $25,000 to nearly $47,000 since October.

“The next leg up is when we start seeing Bitcoin purchases for the ETF itself,” Ayyar said. That could happen in the next week or two.”

“If sentiment is to be believed, we are potentially looking at an accelerated move to new all-time highs some time this year, given we also have the Bitcoin halving coming up in April this year,” Ayyar added.

2023 was bitcoin’s turnaround year

If bitcoin were to reach those levels, it would mark a turnaround for an industry that’s been in the doldrums since the collapse of FTX, the once $32 billion crypto exchange, in 2022. FTX’s founder Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty of all seven criminal counts brought against him by federal prosecutors in the U.S. last year.

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In 2022, bitcoin was already falling sharply, with sky-high inflation and higher interest rates knocking prices of digital currencies across the board.

But FTX’s collapse caused deep distrust in the crypto industry among consumers, business players in the industry and regulators, as one of the largest names in the field was exposed for using assets it held on behalf of customers to make risky trades in other crypto assets and risky crypto-linked derivatives.

The crypto market saw a little over $2 trillion erased from its market capitalization, as investors got cold feet and abandoned digital tokens en masse.

In 2023, however, it was a different story. Bitcoin’s price rose more than doubled for the year, with the token’s price climbing some 152%. Other digital tokens also saw price gains. Ether roughly doubled in price, and XRP, solana, and ada also made strong gains.

“2022 was the worst year for us [but] 2023 happened to be the best year for us. So it’s been the best and worst of times,” Scaramucci said.

Also in 2023, Binance CEO and founder Changpeng Zhao pleaded guilty to criminal charges and stepped down as the company’s CEO as part of a $4.3 billion settlement with the Department of Justice. Many crypto investors see this as a chance to move forward and draw a line under bad behavior in the industry.

Industry executives are calling the start of another bull run. They say that, on top of the approval of a bitcoin ETF, the bitcoin “halving” is a factor that will drive gains in 2024.

The halving, which happens every four years, is an event written in bitcoin’s code. The rewards so-called miners get for mining bitcoin is cut in half. This keeps a cap on the supply of bitcoin, of which there will only ever be 21 million. In previous price cycles, halving preceded a rise in the price of bitcoin.

$250,000 by July?

Tim Draper, founder of Draper Associates, believes the bitcoin halving — along with other factors — could spur the price of bitcoin to hit $250,000 by July.

The billionaire investor said he sees increased bitcoin adoption among mainstream investors and the token’s much-anticipated halving event driving it to a new all-time high.

Bitcoin's price will be above six figures by end of 2024, CoinShares strategy head says

“The halvening, more usage of a currency that is decentralized, trusted, global, [and that] stores value from anywhere,” are all factors that are supportive of bitcoin at the moment, Draper told CNBC.

A major part of Draper’s thesis is that women will drive the adoption of bitcoin in 2024 and beyond.

The investor told CNBC that women “will start to see the need to have at least some bitcoin in case of a run on dollars.”

It’s worth noting Draper, who first invested in bitcoin in 2014, has been wrong about the token’s price trajectory.

He told CNBC in late 2022 that he thought bitcoin would reach $250,000 by June 2023. Draper then said in July 2023 that investors will have to wait “a little longer (maybe 2 years) for bitcoin to hit his $250,000 target.

And despite successful bets on Tesla, Baidu and Skype, Draper’s broader venture investing track record hasn’t been pristine.

The investor once backed Theranos, the controversial blood-testing startup that collapsed after its founder Elizabeth Holmes was accused of defrauding investors. Rather than call her out, Draper doubled down on his support for the entrepreneur, saying he believed critics had “taken down another icon.”

But Draper isn’t the only investor bullish on bitcoin. Tom Lee, managing partner at Fundstrat Global Advisors, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Wednesday that bitcoin could hit $150,000 in the next 12 months, and as much as $500,000 in five years.

And Meltem Demirors, chief strategy officer of CoinShares, told CNBC’s Arjun Kharpal she thinks bitcoin can reach the $100,000 mark — she made that comment before the ETF approval, in response to a question on a hack that led to the SEC falsely posting that it had approved the ETFs late Tuesday.

“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.

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Amazon launches fixed pricing for treatment of conditions such as hair loss. Hims & Hers stock drops 15%

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Amazon launches fixed pricing for treatment of conditions such as hair loss. Hims & Hers stock drops 15%

A worker delivers Amazon packages in San Francisco on Oct. 24, 2024.

David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Amazon on Thursday announced Prime members can access new fixed pricing for treatment of conditions like erectile dysfunction and men’s hair loss, its latest effort to compete with other direct-to-consumer marketplaces such as Hims & Hers Health and Ro.

Shares of Hims & Hers fell as much as 17% on Thursday, on pace for its worst day.

Amazon said in a blog post that Prime members can see the cost of a telehealth visit and their desired treatment before they decide to proceed with care for five common issues. Patients can access treatment for anti-aging skin care starting at $10 a month; motion sickness for $2 per use; erectile dysfunction at $19 a month; eyelash growth at $43 a month, and men’s hair loss for $16 a month by using Amazon’s savings benefit Prime Rx at checkout.

Amazon acquired primary care provider One Medical for roughly $3.9 billion in July 2022, and Thursday’s announcement builds on its existing pay-per-visit telehealth offering. Video visits through the service cost $49, and messaging visits cost $29 where available. Users can get treatment for more than 30 common conditions, including sinus infection and pink eye.

Medications filled through Amazon Pharmacy are eligible for discounted pricing and will be delivered to patients’ doors in standard Amazon packaging. Prime members will pay for the consultation and medication, but there are no additional fees, the blog post said.

Amazon has been trying to break into the lucrative health-care sector for years. The company launched its own online pharmacy in 2020 following its acquisition of PillPack in 2018. Amazon introduced, and later shuttered, a telehealth service called Amazon Care, as well as a line of health and wellness devices.

The company has also discontinued a secretive effort to develop an at-home fertility tracker, CNBC reported Wednesday.

— CNBC’s Annie Palmer contributed to this report.

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WikiLeaks whistleblower Chelsea Manning says censorship is still ‘a dominant threat’

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WikiLeaks whistleblower Chelsea Manning says censorship is still 'a dominant threat'

Chelsea Manning: Censorship still a dominant threat

Former U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning says censorship is still “a dominant threat,” advocating for a more decentralized internet to help better protect individuals online.

Her comments come amid ongoing tension linked to online safety rules, with some tech executives recently seeking to push back over content moderation concerns.

Speaking to CNBC’s Karen Tso at the Web Summit tech conference in Lisbon, Portugal, on Wednesday, Manning said that one way to ensure online privacy could be “decentralized identification,” which gives individuals the ability to control their own data.

“Censorship is a dominant threat. I think that it is a question of who’s doing the censoring, and what the purpose is — and also censorship in the 21st century is more about whether or not you’re boosted through like an algorithm, and how the fine-tuning of that seems to work,” Manning said.

“I think that social media and the monopolies of social media have sort of gotten us used to the fact that certain things that drive engagement will be attractive,” she added.

“One of the ways that we can sort of countervail that is to go back to the more decentralized and distribute the internet of the early ’90s, but make that available to more people.”

Nym Technologies Chief Security Officer Chelsea Manning at a press conference held with Nym Technologies CEO Harry Halpin in the Media Village to present NymVPN during the second day of Web Summit on November 13, 2024 in Lisbon, Portugal. 

Horacio Villalobos | Getty Images News | Getty Images

Asked how tech companies could make money in such a scenario, Manning said there would have to be “a better social contract” put in place to determine how information is shared and accessed.

“One of the things about distributed or decentralized identification is that through encryption you’re able to sort of check the box yourself, instead of having to depend on the company to provide you with a check box or an accept here, you’re making that decision from a technical perspective,” Manning said.

‘No longer secrecy versus transparency’

Manning, who works as a security consultant at Nym Technologies, a company that specializes in online privacy and security, was convicted of espionage and other charges at a court-martial in 2013 for leaking a trove of secret military files to online media publisher WikiLeaks.

She was sentenced to 35 years in prison, but was later released in 2017, when former U.S. President Barack Obama commuted her sentence.

Asked to what extent the environment has changed for whistleblowers today, Manning said, “We’re at an interesting time because information is everywhere. We have more information than ever.”

She added, “Countries and governments no longer seem to invest the same amount of time and effort in hiding information and keeping secrets. What countries seem to be doing now is they seem to be spending more time and energy spreading misinformation and disinformation.”

Manning said the challenge for whistleblowers now is to sort through the information to understand what is verifiable and authentic.

“It’s no longer secrecy versus transparency,” she added.

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SoftBank-backed fintech Zopa aims to double profit this year as it eyes 2025 current account launch

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SoftBank-backed fintech Zopa aims to double profit this year as it eyes 2025 current account launch

Jaidev Janardana, CEO of U.K. digital bank Zopa.

Zopa

LISBON, Portugal — British online lender Zopa is on track to double profits and increase annual revenue by more than a third this year amid bumper demand for its banking services, the company’s CEO told CNBC.

Zopa posted revenues of £222 million ($281.7 million) in 2023 and is expecting to cross the £300 million revenue milestone this year — that would mark a 35% annual jump.

The 2024 estimates are based on unaudited internal figures.

The firm also says it is on track to increase pre-tax profits twofold in 2024, after hitting £15.8 million last year.

Zopa, a regulated bank that is backed by Japanese giant SoftBank, has plans to venture into the world of current accounts next year as it looks to focus more on new products.

The company currently offers credit cards, personal loans and savings accounts that it offers through a mobile app — similar to other digital banks such as Monzo and Revolut which don’t operate physical branches.

“The business is doing really well. In 2024, we’ve hit or exceeded the plans across all metrics,” CEO Jaidev Janardana told CNBC in an interview Wednesday.

He said the strong performance is coming off the back of gradually improving sentiment in the U.K. economy, where Zopa operates exclusively.

Commenting on Britain’s macroeconomic conditions, Janardana said, “While it has been a rough few years, in terms of consumers, they have continued to feel the pain slightly less this year than last year.”

The market is “still tight,” he noted, adding that fintech offerings such as Zopa’s — which typically provide higher savings rates than high-street banks — become “more important” during such times.

“The proposition has become more relevant, and while it’s tight for customers, we have had to be much more constrained in terms of who we can lend to,” he said, adding that Zopa has still been able to grow despite that.

A big priority for the business going forward is product, Janardana said. The firm is developing a current account product which would allow users to spend and manage their money more easily, in a similar fashion to mainstream banking providers like HSBC and Barclays, as well as fintech upstarts such as Monzo.

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“We believe that there is more that the consumer can have in the current account space,” Janardana said. “We expect that we will launch our current account with the general public sometime next year.”

Janardana said consumers can expect a “slick” experience from Zopa’s current account offering, including the ability to view and manage multiple account bank accounts from one interface and access to competitive savings rates.

IPO ‘not top of mind’

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