Aah, graphs always nice.
Since there are a dozen topics on how high the price of BTC can go, I made a projection of BTC's price development in excel. The trouble with projections is...... that it is just that: projections. My sheet is full of assumptions and hand tweaking of numbers to make the graphs look nice. Having said so, let's spit out the outlines of this projection.
- exponential average annual growth factor between 1.6 and 3.5
- 2013 as the start of data (with $150,000 market cap)
- S-curve type price action (meaning faster growth in the beginning and slower at the end)
- correction in the S-curve to account for BTC inception in 2009 instead of 2013 (meaning: already in fast growth mode in 2013)
- 5% final market cap of the current $70-80 trillion (I don't think that is unrealistic)
- hitting $1,000: light green, $10,000: darker green, $100,000: even darker green, full market cap: green
- 4 scenarios ranging from cautious to aggressive
Of course, none of this is scientific; its
make believe 
Nonetheless, the better my assumptions are, the better insight of the
possible price projection. Main assumption is, of course, that Bitcoin will survive all those years and will actively be developed further to accommodate trading to reach a 5% market cap.
Excel spouts out the following sheet:
The graphs that belong to the sheet:
The graphs are not that interesting. Price will reach some $180,000 in either scenario, the S-curve is obviously present in all of them (since unscientifically engineered by me) and details of our current period are lost in the small numbers until the big leap. The only thing interesting is the time frame, but that is clear from the sheet as well. Nevertheless, for the power-graph hungry people I included the graphs.
From the sheet, it appears that a slow scenario vs an aggressive scenario is '
only' 10 years. Nevertheless, if your goal is $100,000/BTC, then it makes a lot of difference whether we take the Android/Youtube/Fabecook route (very fast adaptation, 3-8 years) or the Intel/Phone/TV route ('normal' adaptation, 10-20 years).
The good news is that reaching $1,000 happens more or less at the same moment. In each scenario, the $1,000 mark is reached within the time frame 2016-2017. After that, the differences start to grow. While reaching $10,000 comes relatively fast in all scenario's, reaching $100,000 will take some time. Also in the aggressive scenario, the wait lasts until 2019. That is still 6 years away and 6 years is long in the Internet 2.0 age we're in.
What I take away from this calculation exercise:
- even with a 5% market cap target, the rewards over time look very promising if you get in now with one single BTC
- the real prize ($100,000/BTC) will take some time regardless of the scenario (so for those that only started in 2011 as wannabee millionaires: have patience...)
- reaching $1,000 is a breeze and will happen soon in either scenario
- and the final kicker: look at the aggressive scenario and think of an even more aggressive scenario......
- therefore: buy and hold. Keep on buying at least until $1,000/BTC
The sky is the limit.
