Bitcoin to Smash $150k in 2024: Hedge Fund Manager

GM! This week: A hedge fund manager says Bitcoin will hit $150k this year, SBF calls FTX’s collapse a liquidity crisis (receives 25 years), Ethereum and Solana address meme coin mania, and a Tornado Cash cash developer moves to dismiss his criminal indictment.

Bitcoin’s “Fifth Inning”

As spot Bitcoin ETFs continue to attract billions of dollars in institutional capital, Morgan Creek Capital Management CEO and CIO, Mark Yusko, said the coin’s price is poised to hit $150,000 at some point this year. Not to mention Bitcoin’s halving slated for April, he said.

“Get off zero,” he told investors on CNBC, adding that they should have at least 1% to 3% allocated to the coin. “Bitcoin is King. It is the dominant token. It is a better form of gold.”

Meanwhile, spot Bitcoin ETFs rebounded from a recent week of $888 million in net outflows. Effectively canceling the rout out — digital asset investment products nabbed $862 million last week, according to data from CoinShares’ James Butterfill.

In a Monday interview with Coinage, Grayscale’s Managing Director of Research made the case that Bitcoin’s bull run is in the “fifth inning” as well, with plenty of ball game left based off of several factors, such as the Fed’s rate cut guidance and stablecoin market capitalizations.

Larry Fink’s ETF

Regardless of whether the SEC’s reported bid to designate Ethereum as a security bears fruit, a spot ETF for crypto’s second largest coin would still be feasible, according to Larry Fink. In an interview with Fox Business, the BlackRock CEO largely shrugged at the industry’s concerns.

“I don’t think that designation is going to be too deleterious,” he said of Ethereum’s potential status as a security, adding that he “really can’t talk about” the issue.

As the SEC mulls applications from eight Ethereum ETF hopefuls, predictions on whether the SEC could approve the products in May continues to dip. At the same time, asset manager Bitwise moved to establish a spot Ethereum ETF in a filing last week.

SBF’s Sentencing

The FTX founder and former CEO was sentenced to 25 years behind bars last week, bringing the high-profile trial to a close, for now. Still, the one-time crypto wunderkind defended himself just before his sentence was read — saying FTX fell to mismanagement and not fraud.

The sentence aligned with what one Madoff prosecutor predicted, who argued that Bankman-Fried didn’t deserve to spend 110 years in prison. All in all, the judge that sentenced Bankman-Fried found the former crypto mogul took $11 billion in funds during the relatively short span that FTX existed, in addition to perjuring himself at least three times on the stand.

Judge Kaplan, who delivered Bankman-Fried’s sentence, also cast doubt on the former CEO’s hopes that FTX “customers will hopefully [be] paid back,” calling it speculative and misleading. Reprising testimony from former Alameda Research CEO, Caroline Ellison, Judge Kaplan called Bankman-Fried a man of odds who had gotten caught — still lacking any accountability.

Meme Coin Dilemma

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin published a blog post on meme coins last week, and while his overall view of meme coins was pretty pessimistic, Buterin said some could have potential — namely by devoting a portion of fees or token supply to charity.

At the same time, Buterin said he has zero patience for “coins named after totalitarian political movements, scams, [or] rugpulls,” including a recent rash of tokens with racist, antisemitic, and misogynistic names. Still, Buterin proposed swimming “with this current rather than against it.”

Conversely, applications on Solana clan play a part in preventing hate from spreading by filtering out some projects from their services, the Solana Foundation's Head of Strategy, Austin Federa, said during a panel discussion at the BUIDL Asia summit in Seoul.

"Choice means the right for a wallet developer to institute a block list," he said, per CoinDesk. "Almost every wallet in every ecosystem filters out spam NFTs and spam tokens. Users always have the ability to reveal something if they want to, but the core network needs to remain permissionless."

Storm’s motion

A developer charged with money laundering and sanctions violations over his work on Tornado Cash filed a motion to dismiss his criminal complaint last week. Roman Storm, who is one of several developers facing scrutiny for the project, was arrested last year, and his lawyers made the argument that Tornado Cash is a set of self-custodial smart contracts — not a service.

The move came as Alexy Persetev, another Tornado Cash developer, stood trial in the Netherlands — facing accusations of facilitating the laundering of $1.2 billion through Tornado Cash. In court, prosecutors seized on a “lol” Perstev sent after becoming aware of one $625 million hack routed through Tornado Cash, using it to argue he was well aware of misconduct. 

Other Headlines Around Crypto

• Solana DeFi Trading Hits All-Time High Amid Meme Coin Frenzy (Decrypt)

• UK Financial Watchdog Warns Influencers About ‘Misleading’ Crypto Memes (DL News)

• Tether's Bitcoin Holdings Cross $5 Billion Mark After Latest Purchase (The Block)

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