Cryptocurrency investment firm Bitwise has updated its 10-year bitcoin Bitcoin (BTC) prediction from $1.3 million to $1.6 million, forecasting that the premier digital asset will achieve a compound annual growth rate of 34.3% during this timeframe.
This figure equates to roughly five times the 6.7% yearly return projected for American equities and three times the 10.8% estimation for the runner-up asset class, private equity, drawing on consensus forecasts from JPMorgan, PGIM, BlackRock, and Vanguard.
The revised projection from Bitwise stems from its publication of the 2027 Bitcoin Long-Term Capital Market Assumptions on Wednesday, an annual study evaluating bitcoin’s expected returns, price fluctuations, and drawdowns over the decade ahead.
Bitwise computes its bitcoin valuation goal by forecasting the future dimensions of sectors where the cryptocurrency could rival existing assets, subsequently allocating a specific market percentage to bitcoin. Within a communication to clients issued Wednesday, Bitwise Chief Investment Officer Matt Hougan mentioned that the enterprise maintained its prior market-share percentages from the previous year, though it increased its 2036 projections for the global store-of-value sector from $91 trillion to $110 trillion, alongside the institutional investment sector from $216 trillion to $303 trillion.
Referring to Boston Consulting Group projections indicating that institutional market participants oversee approximately $147 trillion in holdings, with an anticipated allocation between 1% and 5% toward bitcoin across the upcoming decade, Bitwise additionally anticipates between $1.5 trillion and $7.4 trillion in buying pressure, contrasted against merely $14 billion in fresh bitcoin creation annually via mining. The document highlighted that 20.1 million bitcoins, equating to 95.7% of its ultimate cap of 21 million units, are presently in circulation.
For its baseline scenario of $1.6 million, Bitwise presumes that bitcoin will secure 25% of the worldwide store-of-value market alongside 1% of institutional investment capital by 2036. The study’s conservative pessimistic scenario establishes bitcoin at $130,686 by 2036, commanding just 2.5% of the store-of-value domain, whereas its optimistic scenario climbs to $3.67 million assuming a 50% saturation rate.
“We maintain a more optimistic outlook regarding bitcoin today compared to the previous year,” Hougan expressed in a separate press release accompanying the study’s launch. “Every single development transpiring over the past 12 months—ranging from the mildness of the four-year correction, to ongoing regulatory advancements, through to the explosive surge in interest for tangible stores of value like gold—underlines the sustained long-term triumph of bitcoin.”
A maturing asset
This release arrives while market participants persist in debating whether bitcoin’s June troughs near $58,000 signify the termination of the most recent bearish cycle, given that its valuation has subsequently rebounded roughly 40% past the $80,000 threshold.
Bitwise pointed out that the approximate 53% drop measured from an October 2025 all-time high exceeding $126,000 would constitute a notably milder correction than historical cycles, which experienced bitcoin plunging by 86%, 84%, and 77% subsequent to the peak valuations of 2013, 2017, and 2021, respectively.
Hougan conceded that a significant portion of recent capital flowing into store-of-value vehicles targeted gold rather than bitcoin, and that exchange-traded fund acquisitions had moderated. Nonetheless, he asserted that institutional buyers consistently accumulated bitcoin exposure throughout the market slump, while bitcoin’s proportion of the store-of-value landscape expanded from below 1% a decade ago to surpassing 5% presently.
“Throughout the past 17 years, bitcoin has evolved from an unverified concept into an almost $2 trillion asset increasingly held by premier investors globally,” Hougan remarked. “This initial phase represented the arduous challenge—the current phase involves observing its maturation and expansion.”
The cryptocurrency fund administrator likewise projects average bitcoin price fluctuations to diminish toward 27.8% throughout the coming decade, down from the 32.9% estimation outlined in the prior year’s publication.
“Bitcoin will likely preserve its volatile nature accompanied by sharp downward corrections, but indicators overwhelmingly suggest these fluctuations will subside as institutional adoption matures,” stated Bitwise Director of Research Ryan Rasmussen within the announcement. “Driven by institutional capital inflows, escalating appetite for store-of-value instruments, and a constrained supply framework, we anticipate bitcoin will secure its position as the top-performing major institutional asset worldwide between now and 2036.”
Originally published at https://www.theblock.co/news/markets/2026-10-28-bitwise-raises-bitcoin-price-target-to-1-6-million-by-2036-projects-34-annualized-returns-432010.
