Pantera CEO Calls Ripple Victory A Black Swan, But Is It Bad?

A recent release suggests that Pantera CEO Dan Morehead may have predicted the impact of a Ripple victory long before it occurred.  

Ripple Victory: A “Positive Black Swan”

Speaking at the Bloomberg Invest Panel, held back in June, Morehead was quizzed about what “black swans” the world should expect next, considering that we had just recently experienced a pandemic, complete shutdown, and financial crisis due to the pandemic. 

Morehead responded and stated that we already had the “massive shoes drop last year,” most likely in reference to the events surrounding the collapse of prominent crypto firms like FTX, Three Arrows Capital (3AC), Terra, and BlockFi. 

However, while Morehead believed the worst had happened, he noted that the regulatory clarity was something that no one in the crypto community was expecting but could happen soon. 

He stated how that could happen and highlighted the three-year ongoing lawsuit between the SEC and Ripple Labs as one of the ways. 

Considering that “black swan” had been used earlier as a metaphor for disastrous events like the pandemic, Morehead quickly labeled a potential Ripple victory as a “positive black swan.” He emphasized that this could be the next ‘shoe to drop’ and could positively impact the crypto industry.

Interestingly, when Morehead made these comments, he had no idea of the impending victory for Ripple, as he stated that a ruling could go in favor of either party.

About a month later, Judge Analisa Torres ruled in favor of Ripple and said that its secondary XRP sales didn’t constitute an investment contract, nor were programmatic XRP sales classified as a security. 

As predicted by Morehead, Ripple’s victory has undoubtedly had immense impacts on XRP and the crypto community in general. 

Ripple (XRP) price chart from Tradingview.com (Pantera CEO)

Has Ripple’s Victory Provided Regulatory Clarity?

Morehead had predicted that Ripple’s victory would be one of the ways in which the crypto industry attains regulatory clarity. While this may have not yet been attained, it is obvious that Judge Torres’ ruling has provided some form of guidance, especially to firms like Binance and Coinbase

The SEC sued both crypto exchanges in June for allegedly offering unregistered securities on their platforms. Additionally, the regulator also tagged tokens like SOL, ADA, MATIC, ATOM, and ALGO as securities. 

As such, Ripple’s case provides a precedent for these firms to cite when putting forward their arguments in court.

The SEC recognizes the impact that Judge Torres’ ruling could have against it as it continues to clamp down on the crypto industry, and that is why it moved to file an interlocutory appeal against the ruling. 

However, some experts have predicted that the SEC will likely lose when the case is heard upon appeal.

Why Dan Morehead Believes Bitcoin Bull Run Is Around The Corner

The world’s largest cryptocurrency by market cap has been thrown into a state of continuous swing. The price of Bitcoin seems to record constant fluctuation without little or no control. Over the past few days, the bears have been taking the upper hand in the BTC market. Hence, Bitcoin’s performance has been more in the south direction.

With the constant decline of BTC prices, different reactions have erupted in the crypto industry. Many people have been expressing concerns as the price went below the $20K level.

This limit is entirely unexpected for the leading cryptocurrency. This is because the BTC dominance over the altcoins is continuously dropping, indicating that the altcoins are performing better.

However, there are still some supporters of Bitcoin who believe that all hope for the token is not lost. For Pantera Capital CEO Dan Morehead, BTC will soon have the bulls in action. The CEO believes that the price decline for Bitcoin is ending as the token will quickly rally.

Future Is Brighter For Bitcoin

Dan Morehead, a Bitcoin proponent, recently disclosed his opinion during an interview for Bloomberg. He maintained that the future is brighter for BTC as the bull will soon overshadow the current bearish trend.

According to the CEO, it’s a normal experience to have back-and-forth trends in the market. He mentioned that there had been an occurrence of such similar situations in the past. The executive cited the 2018 price decline followed by a surprising bullish trend in subsequent years.

The CEO forecasted that BTC would surge almost by 2.5 times yearly. However, he stressed that the crypto space had experienced lots of transformation over the years. So, besides Bitcoin and Ether, other cryptocurrencies are making waves in the industry.

Morehead recalled that the crypto space had had three prominent bear market cycles. For him, the sequence was that the crypto market had flattened by June 2022.

He stated that though the current situation still looks hard and unstable for the crypto asset, it’s still a stage that is fading. Hence, Morehead believes the next phase comes with the bulls for a rally.

Different Opinions On Future Bull Rally

Other participants in the crypto industry still have different opinions about a possible bullish trend. For example, Brian Armstrong, the CEO of Coinbase, laid out his prediction for the crypto market two weeks ago.

His stance concerning the crypto market is entirely different from that of Morehead. Armstrong called on firms to stay afloat as he believes the decline in the market will last longer.

Bitcoin currently trades in red zone l BTCUSDT on Tradingview.com

According to Armstrong, it could be pleasant to forecast the future situation for the market. However, he thinks the bearish trend will linger for the next 12 to 18 months.

Featured image from Pexels, charts from TradingView.com

Pantera Predicts Correlation Between Bitcoin And Traditional Markets Might Break This Spring

In a recent call with investors, executives from the crypto hedge fund Pantera Capital said they believe DeFi assets such as Ethereum could soon break out of their current correlation to traditional macro markets. The market has seen increasing similarities between these two spaces recently. But there’s no guarantee it will continue or even last for very long at all, given how quickly things change in this industry.

Pantera Capital believes the crypto market will be able to “decouple” traditional macro assets even when interest rates go up.

In the interview on February 1,  CEO Dan Morehead and co-chief investment officer Joey Krug both said they believe this transition is happening now. Institutional investors are entering the space, leading them away from stocks or bonds into cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and other related technologies like the blockchain 2030 panel discussion.

Related Reading | Top 5 Watershed Moments In BTC On-Chain Analysis’ History. Is Your Favorite In?

Pantera Capital Management shared the details from their recent call with investing public on Wednesday this week in a new Blockchain Letter.

Crypto is starting to break from its traditional correlation with macro assets. According to Krug, history has shown that when the former goes down for 70 days before decoupling and trade on its own again over weeks – as we expect soon enough!– crypto’s becoming more resilient by leaps and bounds.

Krug explained;

It doesn’t guarantee that it won’t go down a lot more next month or whenever, but it just means the odds are high that the markets are at an extreme and will bounce back relatively quickly.

Pantera Capital Predictions Proved In the Past

Since February 2021, when BTC traded at around USD 47 thousand after correcting 20% in a week, Krug predicted that “a bitcoin rally might be back by April if not sooner.” The price then increased to over $63,000 before starting intense downturns, bringing its sizes below $30,000.

Bitcoin struggling to maintain $40,000 mark value | Source: BTC/USD Chart of Tradingview.com

Krug said that he does not think the prices for many digital assets are too high right now, with some DeFi tokens trading at P/E multiples ranging from 10-40. They have moderate value; tech stocks go up to 500x turnover rates.

This time around, he further explained why investors shouldn’t worry about over-investing in cryptocurrency or finance. Despite recent crashes caused by several governments imposing restrictions on bank transactions involving Bitcoin (BTC).

Related Reading | Bitcoin Dives To $40K, What Could Trigger More Downsides

P/E (price-to-earnings) ratio is a standard tool used to value stocks and can be found by dividing the market value per share (or token) of an individual company’s portfolio by its annual earnings.

Krug added;

It’s my personal view that USD 2,200 ETH was likely the bottom.

Pantera CEO says you need to consider the cash flow when discounting an asset’s value, which means lower prices if yield rates are higher.

Analysts Reviews

Crypto is not just a thing of value; it’s also an investment. Just as with gold, many factors determine its price and worth. Volatility is one such factor, supply vs. demand within different markets worldwide. As a result, the element can impact how much people want to buy or sell at any given moment in time.

The Pantera CEO said;

It can behave in a very different way from interest-rate-oriented products. I think when all’s said and done, investors will be given a choice. They have to invest in something, and if rates are rising, blockchain is going to be the most relatively attractive.

With tensions rising throughout Europe and Asia, it is expected that inflation will be at an all-time high in 2022. This could give bitcoin (BTC) a valuable hedge against volatility. In addition, provide stability for other digital assets like ethereum or Litecoin during their respective peaks next year.

Bitcoin “remains hesitant,” according to an analyst at GlobalBlock. The bitcoin price has been trading lower recently and did not participate in the futures’ recent rally. However, they are still selling off more than usual compared with spot prices which have dipped even further down over this last week or so.

Marcus Sotiriou, a GlobalBlock analyst, added;

This suggests that this price rise was driven by speculation or hedging rather than genuine demand.

 

Bitcoin To Surpass $120,000 In A Year, Says Pantera CEO

Pantera CEO Dan Morehead has recently revealed his predictions for the price of bitcoin going forward. The CEO runs Pantera Capital, which runs the first bitcoin fund that was launched in the United States. Pantera’s bitcoin fund was launched in 2013, back when the digital asset was worth only $65 per coin.

Given the impeccable timing of when the fund got into bitcoin, it is not surprising that the founder’s thoughts are taken seriously in the cryptocurrency space.  The fund continues to see continued support as more institutional investors are getting into the digital asset. Seeing the recent price dips as a buying opportunity to get into the pioneer cryptocurrency.

Related Reading | On-Chain Expert Predicts $162K Bitcoin Peak This Cycle

A report from Reuters outlined a couple of price predictions made by the fund manager regarding the price of bitcoin. Morehead talked about where he sees the price ending and increased regulatory actions being taken against cryptocurrencies.

Mainstream Adoption To Push Bitcoin Higher

Talking about where bitcoin will be by the end of 2021, Morehead put the price of the digital asset at as much as $80,000 and $90,000 by the end of the year. Morehead also put the price of the digital asset at over $120,000 within the span of a year.

Declining momentum in bitcoin price | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

Going further with the predictions, CEO Dan Morehead put the price of the digital asset at as high as $700,000 in the next decade. The recent price dips and volatility do not seem to faze the fund manager as his price predictions continue to be on the high side.

Morehead’s predictions come despite speculations in the market being the cryptocurrency market might well be headed in the direction of a long bear market.

Increased Regulation Crackdowns In The Market

Talking about where regulation in the market is headed, the Pantera CEO explained that going forward, there would be increased regulatory scrutiny in the market. Pointing to the regulatory crackdowns that Binance has experienced in different countries recently. Morehead referred to the increased regulatory scrutiny as a “transition” phase for the crypto market.

The crypto market in general has seen increasing regulatory debates from countries around the world. United States lawmakers continue to introduce bills aimed at providing proper regulations for the crypto market.

Related Reading | Bitcoin Is More Oversold Than It Was At ATH In April, Says Analyst

Meanwhile, other countries continue to show favorable trends for cryptocurrencies. Earlier in the year, El Salvador’s president announced that the country would be accepting bitcoin as a legal tender. This is scheduled to go into full effect in September of this year.

Dan Morehead’s fund, Pantera Capital, currently manages $2.8 billion in blockchain-related assets. And the fund has invested in crypto exchanges including Coinbase and Binance.

Featured image from PYMNTS.com, chart from TradingView.com

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