For years, naysayers have bashed BTC, claiming that the Bitcoin market cap would never get anywhere close to the likes of Gold and large company stocks. It’s now 2023, and from the looks of it, these non-believers are about to get a very rude awakening.
For starters, Bitcoin hit a total market cap of over a trillion dollars during the last bull run in 2021 and early 2022. This was the highest target achieved by the top coin since it came into existence more than a decade ago.
Bitcoin has been on the fast lane in terms of adoption and awareness over the last few years, and this can be attributed to the growing change of heart among governments and financial institutions that previously spent huge resources in trying to stifle it.
As a matter of fact, the Bitcoin market cap has grown by great magnitudes of late, thanks to governments like Oman that is now mining Bitcoin, El Salvador Bitcoin adoption as legal tender, and even China embracing its existence. The adoption has further been fueled by the entry of institutional investors like Fidelity, MicroStrategy, Grayscale, and many others into the crypto space.
Just recently, BlackRock joined a number of other investor platforms seeking a Bitcoin ETF approval by the US SEC. BlackRock is one of the top asset managers and investment funds in the world.
The truth is that Bitcoin market cap is yet to beat that of its major rival, Gold. Gold market cap is currently posting around $12.4 Trillion while Bitcoin stands at around $562 Billion. As such, Bitcoin market cap is now the 12th largest. Others above it include:
- Gold – $12.4 Trillion
- Apple – $2.7 Trillion
- Microsoft – $2.3 Trillion
- Saudi Aramco – $2.3 Trillion
- Google – $1.7 Trillion
- Amazon – $1.3 Trillion
- Silver – $1.3 Trillion
- Nvidia – $1.1 Trillion
- Meta – $785 Billion
- Tesla – $783 Billion
- Berkshire Hathaway – $782 Billion
As already mentioned, Bitcoin market cap comes in at the 12th place with $562 Billion.
However, it’s worth noting that Bitcoin and the crypto market at large is currently in a bear phase. It was mentioned that BTC scored upwards of $1.2T in market cap during the last bull market. It’s also worth noting that Bitcoin has been on a recovery and consolidation path over the last few months and in the lead up to the next halving expected in early 2024.
The next bull market will most obviously send Bitcoin market cap to a new ATH that will surpass the last high, meaning that the market cap in the near future is expected to hit well above the $2T mark. The halving and the possible approval of Bitcoin ETF will play a major role in this scenario. In fact, a Bitcoin ETF will be the single-most important event in the Bitcoin industry in pushing adoption over the last few years. More adoption means more demand, and that translates into higher prices and larger Bitcoin market cap.
Many analysts and investors have projected Bitcoin price to reach the highs above the $100k and $180k in the next run. That means an upsurge of the total market cap by sizeable magnitudes of at least 5 times the current level. At the moment, Bitcoin is trading at around the $26k – $27k level and holding on. In any case, we can expect the BTC market cap to be in the top 5 among assets in the world in the next cycle.
Note that this projection is focused on Bitcoin compared to other assets, and not entire asset classes like real estate, debt market (Treassuries, etc), and other commodities like fuel. Bitcoin as a store of value is comparable to others like Gold and stocks as opposed to fast-moving commodities like Oil.
