Major Bitcoin (BTC) bull, programmer and 2020 United States presidential campaigner John McAfee has explained why Bitcoin will hit $1 million in 2020.
“I said $1 million and I’m sticking to one”
McAfee, known for his brave prediction that the biggest cryptocurrency will hit $500,000 in 2020, has defended his recently doubled down bet that Bitcoin will cost $1 million per coin in 2020 in a Forbes interview on Sept. 30.
In the interview, McAfee argues that the main trigger for Bitcoin’s surging price will be its scarcity, which means that BTC supply is limited by 21 million coins, adding that a significant fraction was apparently lost forever. McAfee said:
“Let’s get real, there are only 21 million bitcoins, seven million of which have been lost forever, and then, if Satoshi is dead, add a few more million.”
85% of Bitcoin’s total supply already mined by August 2019
As Cointelegraph reported, the amount of mined BTC reached 17,850,000 on Aug. 1, with Bitcoin surpassing 85% of its total supply in circulation, leaving just 3.15 million coins to mine in the next 120 years. Since the time of publication, Bitcoin added over 100,000 coins to its supply and has 17,968,000 in circulation at press time, according to Blockchain.com data.
Meanwhile, BTC saw one of the biggest sell-offs last week when the major cryptocurrency lost $1,500 in less than a day for the first time in months. Later Bitcoin touched a new multi-month low — below $7,800.
At press time, BTC is trading at around $8,268, down 1.1% over the past 24 hours, according to Coin360. After seeing some notable volatility this year, Bitcoin is still up more than 27% over a yearly period from trading at $6,500 in October 2018.
Bitcoin one-year price chart. Source: Coin360
Bitcoin is a store of value, lacks privacy
In the interview, McAfee has also emphasized his stance towards the primary function of Bitcoin, urging that it represents simply a store of value. Meanwhile, other types of digital assets such as stablecoins and so-called privacy coins are designed for transaction purposes, McAfee noted.
Yesterday, major German bank BayernLB released a report, predicting that Bitcoin will hit $90,000 in 2020 due to the upcoming halving.
