Billionaire and cryptocurrency bull Tim Draper is holding steady to his $250,000 Bitcoin prediction by 2022.
He first made the prediction on April 12th, at ‘2018 Block (Chain) Party’, at his self-named Draper University in San Mateo, California.
He said then: “I’m thinking $250,000 a bitcoin by 2022.”
“Believe it. They’re going to think you’re crazy, but believe it. It’s happening and it’s going to be awesome!”
Draper is still one of Bitcoin’s biggest bulls, even as Bitcoin is down more than 67% from its all-time high.
Tim Draper, however, has a pretty good track record when it comes to Bitcoin prices.
He bought in at an estimated $650 per coin in 2014.
He won nearly 30,000 Bitcoins from the U.S. Marshals Service in an auction after closure of online drug market Silk Road. The site had been using Bitcoin to illegally sell contraband.
Draper at the time correctly predicted that Bitcoin would top $10,000 by the end of 2017. The cryptocurrency rose above $13,000 on December 31, 2017.
“Price-wise, we’ll continue to see Bitcoin move higher,” he says now.
“I’ve revised my estimate up to $250,000 four years out, so we’ll see Bitcoin trade around the $250,000 mark in 2022.”
Draper further went on to say that the ongoing dip in Bitcoin had not caused his confidence to waver.
His reasoning is that cryptocurrencies will, as he puts it, “increase the velocity of money.”
This increased speed in transactions and trade consequently will push the current global currency market to hit $140 trillion.
Draper expects this to happen within a next decade.
Money velocity
“I expect that since cryptocurrencies will increase the velocity of money, the current $86 trillion global market for currency will grow to be about $140 trillion in the next 10 years, and that growth will be in crypto,” he said.
“In fact, I estimate that fiat currencies will actually decrease in use, and that crypto will become as much as $100 trillion of that market. I expect Bitcoin to be about 10% of that market, or $10 trillion,” he said.
“There is a lot of room to grow there.”
Tim Draper sees no reason to sell or trade off his Bitcoin holdings
“Moving from crypto to fiat is like trading shells for gold. It is reverting to the past,” he said.
“I’m thinking long term I’ll use it [Bitcoin], spend it, invest it, or just keep it.”
This comes as more people see Bitcoin as a store of value, and not as the day-to-day currency as proposed.
Innovations such as the Lightning Network and other altcoins suggest there is still a way to make good on Bitcoin’s original promise. And Draper accepts that, too.
“I believe that in about four years there will be a big change when people start paying in cryptocurrency,” he said. “Fiat currency will eventually become as passé as trying to pay for coffee with pennies.”
