Bitcoin Won’t Hit $200,000 This Year, Crypto Bull Concedes. Where It’s Going Instead.

Bitcoin was hovering above the $90,000 level Tuesday ahead of the decision on interest rates from the Federal Reserve. (Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)

Key Points

• Bitcoin is down around 30% from its early October record high of over $126,000.
• Standard Chartered’s Geoff Kendrick revises his year-end Bitcoin forecast to $100,000 from $200,000 by late 2025.
• Kendrick maintains a long-term Bitcoin forecast of $500,000, now expected by 2030 instead of 2028.

Bitcoin has come crashing down recently and so too have bullish price predictions for the world’s largest cryptocurrency.

The crypto was slipping again Tuesday, threatening to fall below the $90,000 level even as the market remained confident of an interest-rate cut from the Federal Reserve on Wednesday–something that typically supports digital assets. It’s around 30% off its record high of above $126,000 hit in early October.

The weakness was enough to finally torpedo one of the more bullish year-end price targets.

Standard Chartered’s Geoff Kendrick conceded Tuesday that Bitcoin will not reach his $200,000 target by the end of the year–a forecast he has stood by for over a year. Instead, he now expects Bitcoin to hit $100,000 by the end of 2025.

However, he’s still very bullish and described the recent slump as “not a crypto winter, just a cold breeze,” in a note Tuesday. Kendrick still maintains a long-term forecast of $500,000, but now expects that to happen in 2030, rather than 2028.

“Recent price action in Bitcoin has been challenging, to say the least. But we think the decline, while rapid, falls within ‘normal’ expectations–the 36% drop from the all-time high reached on Oct. 6 is similar in scale to previous drawdowns,” he said.

Kendrick noted that further corporate buying by crypto treasury companies was “likely over” and that future Bitcoin price increases will be driven by one thing only–ETF buying.

“We still think this target [$500,000 by 2030] is attainable, as portfolio optimization between Bitcoin and gold continues to show that global portfolios are underweight Bitcoin,” he said.

Bitcoin at last check was trading at $90,288, down around 1.9% over the past 24 hours, according to CoinDesk. Ethereum , the second-largest crypto, was 1.2% down at $3,106, and popular altcoin XRP was down 1.8% at $2.06.

Write to Callum Keown at callum.keown@dowjones.com