Bitcoin has a slew of catalysts on the horizon. The first three are increasing demand/buyers.

1.  As I’ve written about before Microstrategy, the public company that owns the most bitcoin is selling $750 million worth of new stock to buy more bitcoin. 

2. El Salvador, the first country to make bitcoin legal tender, is on their way to selling $1 billion in bitcoin bonds. $500 million will be used to buy bitcoin directly.   $500 million will be used to buy bitcoin miners. 

3. At least 7 Bitcoin Spot ETF’s have been filed in the USA. This in itself is not new. There have been many filed in the past that have been rejected, for no good reason. The first one filed in this latest round has been pushed off by the SEC and opened for comments by the public, a delay tactic. But they can’t delay forever. They have to give a final ruling in January 2024. Many other countries around the world have bitcoin spot ETFs active. There is no good reason to not approve one. One will eventually be approved in the USA either now or later. Once that happens there will be a lot of new buyers of bitcoin. Currently it is rather difficult to buy bitcoin with many funds, 401k’s, IRA, regular brokerage account. But when you are able to buy a bitcoin spot ETF in any of those funds with money you already have in those accounts that just opens a lot more money to buy bitcoin. 

The 4th catalyst is a supply reducing catalyst. The next bitcoin halving is currently going to happen on April 17th, 2024. Bitcoin miners are rewarded for protecting the bitcoin network with “new” bitcoin. They have to sell a lot of these bitcoin to pay for their electricity costs. They currently receive 6.25 BTC per block. In April 2024 it will drop to 3.125 BTC. Since there will be less bitcoin being sold by miners, if the demand remains the same it’s likely bitcoin will appreciate in value. 

While bitcoin is very volatile it should be remembered that the goal of bitcoin is to not be volatile. It is currently volatile due to all the people speculating on its future value. Some people bought it 6 months ago and it’s doubled in price so they are selling because they have made 2x their initial money. In the long run bitcoin’s price will only go up as the value of goods grows. It will only go up with inflation. That is the end goal of bitcoin.