12 Future Bitcoin Scenarios: From Bullish to Bearish

A lot has changed since then. When I started reporting, the price of Bitcoin was around $25,000, which seemed astronomically high at the time. No one had ever heard of SBF, Bitcoin Ordinals or ChatGPT. No one owned a Bitcoin ETF.

Therefore, when Bitcoin enters that market, fourth half April of this year is the time to update and revise these scenarios, again ranging from bullish to bearish. And once again, we vaguely defined “the future” as 10 years from now. Far enough away that there's room to play, and close enough that there's a connection to reality.

One thing hasn't changed about our methodology: It is the humbling realization that we are not all flying blind, but none of us are flying blind. Really We know what happens with Bitcoin. That's part of the charm. “Most of the biggest use cases 10 years from now will be things that sound insane to us today,” Elizabeth Stark told me in 2021. -Wikipedia era. ”

From regulatory hell to telepathic DeFi, welcome to the future of Bitcoin.

Swan CEO Cory Klipsten imagines that in 10 years, Bitcoin will finally be used in mainstream ways to pay for things like coffee, beer, and donuts. “By 2035, he will be able to buy most of the world's goods and services with the SAT,” predicts Klipsten.

This doesn't mean he thinks Bitcoin will fully replace the dollar. He predicts that most products will come with “two price tags.” One is fiat currency and the other is Bitcoin. “It's not going to replace all fiat currencies,” Klipsten said. “As always, we will live in a multi-currency world.”

There are over 3 billion gamers on the planet. Des Dickerson, CEO of THNDR Games, envisions a future where billions of gamers get paid in Bitcoin thanks to the speed of his Lightning network. “Bitcoin should be the native currency of the internet,” Dickerson said. “So it goes without saying that Bitcoin should essentially be in the game.”

Of course, this is all still just theory. Dickerson acknowledged that THNDR already has 1.5 million users, but “until there are viral games that use Bitcoin, we won't see mass adoption.”

In the first line of his whitepaper, Satoshi Nakamoto describes Bitcoin as a peer-to-peer electronic cash that “allows online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution.” doing.

These words have been discussed and analyzed for over 15 years. For many in this field, these are more symbolic and inspirational than “We believe these truths to be self-evident.” And the important clause for many people is that it does not involve financial institutions.

That's why Bitcoin's biggest story of 2024, the emergence of ETFs, is in some ways a troubling move. Isaiah Jackson, author of “Bitcoin and Black America,” sees ETFs as a double-edged sword. On the other hand, yes, ETFs unlock a pipeline of new capital, which Jackson believes will “drive prices higher.” (So ​​far, the charts are in line.) But again, the capital injected by the ETF gives even more power to the BlackRocks and Fidelities of the world. “If you have enough Bitcoin, you can buy lobbyists,” Jackson said. “And you can convince them [politicians] Things like, “We need to control Bitcoin mining.” ”

This concern is echoed by Wendy O (formerly CoinDesker), host of The O Show. She acknowledges the very real benefits of “ethically suffering” on the tailwinds of Bitcoin's ETF-driven price increases, but at the same time, “TradFi steps in and buys Bitcoin on our behalf.” I'm also envisioning a scenario in which I manage the system.

As AI continues to evolve, we will soon see “smart agents” that can book flights, pay bills, order Thai food, and more.

“No one gives an AI a bank account, but Bitcoin is perfect as a native digital means for an AI to transact,” he says, creating a decentralized platform for AI agents to transact and spend. said David Johnston, lead contributor to the Morpheus project. Cipher. (Although Morpheus is technically “chain agnostic,” the potential for Bitcoin seems obvious.)

The role of Bitcoin and AI extends beyond satellite consumption. “If you have a smart agent who can send transactions and access DeFi, you have access to a whole new set of tools,” Johnston says. In the same way that ChatGPT has made it possible for non-programmers to program using simple English, in the future it will be possible for non-programmers to program using advanced DeFi without using banks. It makes the tools easier to use, Johnston says.

Johnston gives a simple example. “Suppose you want to earn native Bitcoin yield without using any wrapping, bridges, or third parties.” This is difficult for a layman. (Not that the average person would say the words “native Bitcoin yield,” but you get the idea.) With AI-powered Bitcoin, Johnston says, all you have to do is say something like: . And you'll be doing some research to find a solid, reputable, non-administrative solution where YouTube influencers aren't worth a shilling's worth of crap.

Of all the Bitcoin crystal balls, this one is probably the foggyest. “We have no idea what's going to happen with regulations,” Wendy O. says. She is encouraged by El Salvador's pro-Bitcoin policies, but is concerned that in the US there is “so much bureaucracy, so many public servants in so many places.” It is divided into various fields and no one knows what to classify it into. Although she sees a complete ban on Bitcoin as unlikely, she worries that governments could “make it harder to participate in the ecosystem.”

Or, as Jackson suspects, the government could create “some sort of bottleneck” in converting Bitcoin into fiat currency, such as forcing it to be converted to a CBDC (central bank digital currency) first. Maybe it's being created. In Jackson's view, if the value of one Bitcoin soars to $1 million in 10 years, and the government's digital currency needs to be used as a subsidy, “a lot of people will fall into the trap to get a CBDC.” I think that's what they want from surveillance and control. ”

Klipsten acknowledges the regulatory risks, but doubts politics will ultimately work in Bitcoin's favor. “The rules change based on the will of the residents,” Klipsten said. “At some point, there will be a lot of people who almost own Bitcoin…and they will make things very difficult for the politicians who get in their way.”

This scenario flows directly from the end. According to Jackson, if governments are somehow successful in reining in or over-regulating Bitcoin, there will naturally be a desire for “black market Bitcoin,” or Bitcoin outside the government's network. For example, someone who earns Bitcoin through home mining, or someone who owns Bitcoin that is more difficult (if not impossible) to track with tools like Chainanaracy.

These concerns are not new. The FBI has been tracking Bitcoin for more than a decade, and while some see it as a strong law enforcement agency, others see it as a surveillance nightmare. So, with increased tracking and regulation, we could live in a world of “2 Bitcoins” or “Shadow Bitcoins”, where perhaps people pay his 1 price for a tracking Bitcoin and shadow You will pay a premium for Bitcoin.

Again, Jackson acknowledges the concerns, but also believes it would be difficult in practice for the government to do so. Jackson says that once we reach mainstream adoption, literally; billions of The number of Bitcoin wallets is huge, so “good luck trying to shut them all down.”

This is very simple, but sometimes the simplest scenario is the most likely. Don't sleep on common sense. “Bitcoin’s core value proposition is a global digital store of value,” said Anthony Pompliano, aka “Pump” of Pump Investments. “There are other potential use cases that could come to fruition, but the core proposition is the one most likely to last for decades.”

Pump even sees a generational shift. He said that in the same way that the S&P 500 is a benchmark for stock investors, Bitcoin currently serves as a “benchmark for a lot of young investors.” “If they can’t outperform Bitcoin, they just ‘buy the index,’” Pomp says.

In early 2021, long before the AI ​​hype exploded, Elizabeth Stark told me that “machines natively and instantly pay machines” and “Tesla pays for charging with Lightning” via the Bitcoin network. He said that he envisions a future where .

Three years later, her prediction seems even more realistic. It's likely that machines and even robots will someday require us to spend money on them. And “robot” doesn't have to mean Terminator. It could be something as simple as the Internet of Things. And what are the chances that these robots and machines will spend US dollars from Wells Fargo accounts?

“Bitcoin, stablecoins, and digital currencies will be the currencies of choice for many automation use cases,” Pump said, adding that machines seeking instant payments “will not use e-money because payments take several days. It will become unusable.'' This is where Bitcoin and stablecoins can truly shine. ”

This may seem like a familiar or even boring topic to those who closely follow the world of cryptocurrencies, but it may seem like a familiar or even boring topic to those who closely follow the world of cryptocurrencies, but if you ask a random person at the grocery store: What do you think?'' and you'll probably get some weird looks. (Also, don't do this.) Ordinal numbers are still far from mainstream. But that could happen in 10 years, and it could change everything about the world of digital collectibles, making 2021's NFT Summer seem quaint by comparison.

“Once we start getting close to mass adoption, I think people will start using ordinal numbers, because ordinal numbers are more secure than NFTs,” says Wendy, who also doubts this is “still a long way off.”

“I know this isn't a very exciting story,” said Cas Piancey, co-host of the podcast Crypto Critics' Corner. It is primarily used for the exact same purpose for which it is intended.”

Piancey is a self-described crypto cynic, but that doesn't mean he's a big fan of Bitcoin. He understands the nuances. “When people claim that it's not The use case for Bitcoin, I fundamentally disagree with that,” he says. And he imagines that Bitcoin will still be used on the margins of money transfers in 10 years. It will still be used sporadically as a dissident tool. And even now, it is kept by many people as a valuable item.

He is not a destroyer. As a result, he imagines Bitcoin will still be soaring 10 years from now, but warns: “Anyone who says Bitcoin is going to be the next world currency is crazy.”

Perhaps Bitcoin will be hacked by quantum computing.Maybe there is Attack power 51%. Perhaps Bitcoin will be destroyed by ChatGPT7.

So this is like an “all-encompassing doomsday scenario” to humbly admit that we don't know what we don't know. (For apocalyptic risks, see original work) Many in this field say that Bitcoin's dominance is “inevitable,” but in reality this is rarely the case. Inevitable — just ask Thanos.

Isaiah Jackson is, as you might expect, bullish on Bitcoin, but even he admits that hacking with quantum computing, for example, is still theoretically possible. He believes the risk is low and suspects evil quantum hackers will focus first on more attractive targets, such as sovereign states, but admits it is “always a risk”. .

In the original “Future of Bitcoin” article, Jackson provided the simplest one. fun Scenario: At some point Bitcoin will be used on Mars.

Now he's back to outdo himself.

Jackson is thinking about Noland Erbaugh, who is paralyzed from the shoulders down. Mr. Arbaugh then became the first patient to have his Neuralink chip implanted in his brain, and he can now play chess and even send tweets just by thinking. After “thinking” the tweet into existence, Arbouf said, “It was like an exercise of force.”

Then Jackson realized something. If we can send a tweet just by thinking in 2024, it's only a matter of time before we can send Bitcoin telepathically. “The guy just thought of a tweet and it showed up,” Jackson says. Someday we'll think, “Here's the code for a private Bitcoin wallet.”