Bitcoin could hit $1.6 million by 2036, Bitwise forecasts

Bitwise has raised its long-term Bitcoin price forecast to $1.6 million by 2036, citing institutional demand, limited new supply, and growing demand for assets that can protect against currency debasement.

Bitwise Asset Management released its 2027 Bitcoin Long-Term Capital Market Assumptions on Oct. 28, setting out a decade-long investment case that rests on Bitcoin gaining ground in several markets, led by its use as a store of value.

Bitcoin’s $1.6 million forecast rests on a growing store-of-value market

In its valuation framework, Bitwise projects the combined gold-and-Bitcoin store-of-value market will reach $109.8 trillion by 2036, with Bitcoin taking 25%. The model assigns smaller contributions to institutional portfolios, emerging-market currencies, offshore wealth, national reserves, US corporate treasuries, and remittances.

The report’s base case assumes 2.5% penetration of both national treasury reserves and US corporate treasuries. Its institutional investment assumption is 1%, against a projected market of $303.5 trillion.

Using the rounded table inputs, the store-of-value component contributes $27.45 trillion of Bitcoin’s modeled value. Dividing that amount by the model’s 21 million-coin denominator produces approximately $1.31 million per coin before the other categories are included.

Bitwise’s valuation table uses a Sept. 30 Bitcoin price of $83,557. Its exact base-case target is $1,599,766, alongside bear and bull scenarios of $130,686 and $3,667,911.

As crypto.news previously reported in August 2025, the firm’s earlier Bitcoin forecast put its base case at $1.3 million by 2035, with an annualized return of 28.3%. The earlier report outlined a $3 million bull case and an $88,000 bear case.

Calculated from the two rounded headline targets, the revision amounts to $300,000, or 23.1%. The forecast horizon moves forward by one year, from 2035 to 2036.

Institutional allocations underpin Bitwise’s demand estimates

In its accompanying announcement, Bitwise said institutional investors could allocate 1% to 5% of their portfolios to Bitcoin over the coming decade. The firm estimated potential demand at $1.5 trillion to $7 trillion, compared with roughly $14 billion in new Bitcoin produced annually at its reference valuation.

Chief Investment Officer Matt Hougan linked the revised forecast to regulatory progress, institutional adoption and demand for hard assets, including gold.

“We are more bullish on bitcoin today than we were last year,” Hougan said in the announcement.

In the release, the firm forecasts annual returns of 6.7% for US equities and 10.8% for private equity, below its Bitcoin estimate. With institutions accounting for more of the investor base, Bitwise expects the historic four-year cycle to weaken, while warning that substantial downturns will remain possible.

On its research page, Bitwise projects average volatility of 27.8% and an average correlation of 0.43 with US stocks over the next decade. The firm identifies quantum computing, AI-driven mathematical advances and regulatory reversal as major risks to its investment case.

ARK’s earlier targets use different adoption and supply assumptions

ARK Invest’s April 2025 Bitcoin valuation study set 2030 bear, base and bull cases of approximately $300,000, $710,000 and $1.5 million. The firm modeled institutional investment, digital gold and emerging-market demand as its main contributors, with national reserves, corporate treasuries and on-chain financial services providing smaller contributions.

Within that framework, ARK assumed institutional penetration of 1%, 2.5% and 6.5% across its three scenarios. Its digital-gold assumptions ranged from 20% to 60% of an $18 trillion gold market, which the model held constant through 2030.

Coverage in April 2025 of ARK’s experimental supply model outlined a potential $2.4 million target. ARK’s underlying study separately explored an active-supply approach that discounted lost or long-held coins, assuming only 60% of projected supply remained active by 2030.

A Nov. 6, 2025 report subsequently described Cathie Wood’s revised bullish target of $1.2 million, down from $1.5 million. Citing her CNBC interview, the report said stablecoins were taking part of the payments and savings role ARK had previously expected Bitcoin to serve in emerging markets.

ViaBTC’s Ko sees accumulation alongside complacent positioning

Commenting on recent market conditions, Jeff Ko, chief analyst at ViaBTC, described Bitcoin’s trading as volatile but relatively constructive in comments to the publication.

“I think market positioning remains somewhat complacent, and it looks like an accumulation period,” Ko said.

According to Ko, funding rates remained positive while open interest had partially recovered from its September lows. He said Bitcoin had reclaimed its 50-week moving average and held above it for four to five weeks, a development he described as encouraging.

In the same assessment, Ko said Bitcoin briefly recovered toward $84,000 before slipping below $80,000. Spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded approximately $300 million in net inflows, he said, ending two consecutive weeks of outflows.

In Ko’s account of the macro backdrop, Brent crude had climbed 6.2% in the preceding week before easing toward $115 on Monday amid diplomatic efforts to reduce Middle East tensions. He put the US 10-year Treasury yield near 4.97%, compared with roughly 5.36% earlier in October.

Ko said investors assessing technology earnings would be looking beyond headline results to determine whether substantial spending on AI infrastructure was producing sustainable returns, following the recent correction in AI-related equities.

Ko reported continued weakness in Ethereum relative to Bitcoin, with ETH/BTC near 0.029 and spot Ethereum ETFs recording a fourth consecutive week of net outflows.