Bitcoin May Sink To $50K Before Rallying, Standard Chartered’s Kendrick Warns

Standard Chartered’s Geoffrey Kendrick says Bitcoin might nonetheless face a remaining washout to $50,000 earlier than recovering sharply, arguing that the present drawdown seems to be extra like a macro-led tech capitulation than a crypto-specific breakdown.

Speaking on Deribit’s Crypto Options Unplugged, Kendrick, the financial institution’s international head of digital belongings analysis, said he nonetheless expects Bitcoin to finish the 12 months at $100,000 and attain $500,000 by 2030, at the same time as he warned that the near-term setup stays fragile.

“Picking the underside is at all times extraordinarily troublesome,” Kendrick stated, framing the latest selloff as principally orderly exterior a couple of risky weeks. He argued that institutional positioning has held up higher than many anticipated, pointing to comparatively sticky ETF publicity and continued shopping for from MicroStrategy even after the inventory’s premium to web asset worth fell beneath one.

Still, Kendrick stated the market will not be completed deleveraging. “I think we might nonetheless see that remaining capitulation. Now, it may very well be macro pushed,” he stated. “Bitcoin and crypto belongings extra broadly continues to be very extremely correlated with the Nasdaq.” In his view, weaker earnings from massive US tech names over the following few months, mixed with a scarcity of instant Federal Reserve help, might drag crypto decrease alongside equities.

That, he stated, is what makes the $50,000 stage believable. Kendrick in contrast the potential transfer with prior cycle drawdowns, noting {that a} decline to that zone would nonetheless be shallower than the roughly 75% peak-to-trough drop seen within the earlier cycle. The key distinction this time, he argued, is the absence to date of a serious inside crypto failure on the scale of FTX.

Why Kendrick Is Long-Term Bullish On Bitcoin

Even so, Kendrick’s medium- and long-term thesis stays emphatically bullish. He tied that outlook much less to short-term buying and selling flows than to what he sees as a structural shift pushed by stablecoins and tokenized real-world belongings. Last 12 months, when stablecoins stood round $200 billion, Kendrick projected they may develop to $2 trillion by the tip of 2028. He stated the market is now nearer to $300 billion, with a lot of that demand coming not from crypto buying and selling however from financial savings use instances in rising markets.

“What’s changed it has primarily been financial savings in rising markets,” Kendrick stated, referring to stablecoins’ authentic function as on-off ramps for crypto buying and selling. “On my estimate of the $300 billion, about $200 [billion] is for EM financial savings use case.” He added that a lot of that capital seems to sit down in massive wallets and turns over sometimes, suggesting it’s getting used extra as saved worth than transactional float.

Kendrick’s broader argument is that this pattern might have macro penalties properly past crypto. If stablecoin issuers take up near $1 trillion in extra T-bill demand over the following three years, he stated, the US Treasury might reply by shifting issuance towards the entrance finish, flattening the yield curve and reinforcing greenback demand. In his telling, that liquidity impact might ultimately turn into a tailwind for threat belongings, together with Bitcoin.

“I believe we go all the way down to, let’s say, $50,000 and again to $100,000 by the tip of this 12 months and $500,000 by 2030,” Kendrick stated. “Ironically, if stablecoins are huge and Genius Act is as it’s, the influx of money on liquidity and flattening yield curve and all that type of stuff turns into massively supportive of Bitcoin medium time period.”

He prolonged that optimism throughout different large-cap crypto belongings. Kendrick stated he sees Ethereum reaching $40,000 and Solana hitting $2,000 by 2030, with Ethereum benefiting from stablecoin and tokenization exercise and Solana from ultra-low-cost transaction flows and micropayments. He additionally projected tokenized real-world belongings might develop from roughly $40 billion immediately to $2 trillion by the tip of 2028.

For now, although, Kendrick’s message was much less about chasing momentum than about separating market worth from underlying adoption. “Pretty a lot all of the underlying metrics, should you like, have been bettering,” he stated. “Except for the worth.”

At press time, Bitcoin traded at $70,260.