(Kitco News) – Bitcoin’s (BTC) price experienced a 5% sell-off from last Friday's high, hitting a low of $94,585 in early trading on Monday as traders took profits following its 50% surge since November 4, but according to analysts at VanEck, there is still a long way to go in this bull market, and BTC remains on track to hit $180,000 in 2025.
“As we anticipated in our September Bitcoin ChainCheck, Bitcoin (BTC) price has surged upward in a high-volatility, post-election rally,” wrote VanEck analysts Nathan Frankovitz and Matthew Sigel. “Now in uncharted territory with no technical price resistance, we believe the next phase of the bull market is just beginning.”
“This pattern mirrors what happened four years ago, when Bitcoin’s price doubled between the 2020 election and year-end, followed by an additional ~137% gain in 2021,” they added. “With a transformative shift in government support for Bitcoin underway, investor interest is rising rapidly; we are receiving inbound calls at an accelerating pace as many investors find themselves under-allocated to the asset class.”
“While we remain vigilant for signs of overheating, we reiterate our cycle price target of $180k BTC as a number of key indicators we track continue to signal green for this rally,” they said.
One reason for the continued bullishness is rising market sentiment, as “Bitcoin’s 7-day moving average (7 DMA) is at an all-time high,” the analysts noted. “With Trump as the president-elect, regulatory headwinds are turning into tailwinds for the first time. Trump has already started appointing pro-crypto figures across the executive branch, while the Republican party now holds a unified government, increasing the likelihood of supportive legislation.”
“Such legislation includes proposals like creating a national Bitcoin reserve—the odds of which are trading at 34% on Polymarket as of November 19th—and rewriting crypto market structure and stablecoin draft legislation,” they added. “Under new leadership, we expect FIT21 will be rewritten in market- and privacy-friendly terms, while new stablecoin drafts will allow state-chartered banks to issue stablecoins without Fed approval.”
“At a time when nations like BRICS are exploring alternatives like Bitcoin to bypass USD sanctions and currency manipulation, stablecoins offer a strategic opportunity to export the U.S. dollar globally,” Frankovitz and Sigel noted. “By removing regulatory hurdles and enabling state-chartered banks to issue stablecoins, the U.S. can defend the dollar’s global influence and capitalize on crypto’s faster adoption in emerging markets, where financial services, hedges against local currency inflation, and DeFi are in high demand.”
The analysts said they expect the Trump administration to repeal the SEC’s Staff Accounting Bulletin 121 (SAB 121) – which deals with banks being able to custody crypto assets for clients – providing another tailwind for the crypto market.
“We expect SAB to be repealed within Trump’s first quarter, if not by the SEC, then by Congress, spurring banks to announce crypto custody solutions,” they said. “If Gary Gensler hasn’t already resigned, we anticipate Trump will follow through on his promise to replace the SEC chairman, favoring more crypto-friendly candidates and ending the agency’s notorious ‘regulation by enforcement’ era.”
“Additionally, we expect that in 2025, U.S. ETH ETFs will be amended to support staking, the SEC will accept the SOL ETF 19b-4, and in-kind creation and redemption will make these ETFs more tax-efficient and liquid,” they added. “As Trump has previously acknowledged the shared energy-intensive nature of Bitcoin mining and AI, we anticipate energy deregulation—leading to cheaper, more abundant baseload power (e.g., nuclear)—will drive global leadership in energy, AI, and Bitcoin.”
Overall, they said that Trump’s election “marks a bullish turning point, reversing years of offshoring jobs and capital caused by previous hawkish leadership. By fostering entrepreneurial dynamism, the U.S. is poised to become a global leader in crypto innovation and employment, transforming crypto into a critical industry for domestic growth and a key export to emerging markets.”
While Bitcoin has been the driving force behind the post-Trump election rally, Frankovitz and Sigel suggested King Crypto could soon step to the side as altcoins begin to rally, a development that occurs with regularity during bull market cycles.
“The 7-day moving average of Bitcoin dominance, a measure of Bitcoin’s market cap relative to all crypto’s aggregate market cap, rose 2 points to 59% this month, reaching levels not seen since March 2021,” they noted. “While the uptrend from 40% in November 2022 may persist in the near term, we expect it to peak soon.”
“In September, we noted that a Harris victory might favor Bitcoin dominance due to Bitcoin’s clearer regulatory status as a commodity,” they said. “In contrast, Trump’s pro-crypto stance and growing cabinet will likely spur investment more broadly across the crypto space. With Bitcoin reaching new highs under a pro-innovation regulatory backdrop, wealth effects, and regulatory de-risking are poised to attract both crypto-native capital and new institutional investment into DeFi, boosting returns in the long tail of the asset class.”
To help gauge the bull market's potential upside and remaining duration, Frankovitz and Sigel looked at the derivatives market and perpetual futures, “where funding rates offer insight into market sentiment and help gauge the likelihood of an overheated market.”
“As markets skew, funding rates automatically rise to incentivize balance and compensate traders for directional risk,” they explained. “Thus, sustained high funding rates may be used to indicate an overheated market.”
“Starting from April 2020, we analyzed periods when the 30-day moving average perpetual funding rate exceeded 10%,” they noted. “These periods averaged ~66 days with 17% returns from open to close, though individual durations varied significantly. Only one period—the single-day spike on June 18th, 2024—was tactical, reflecting a short-term reaction. All other instances lasted several weeks, highlighting structural bullish sentiment that often drives significant short- to medium-term gains.”
“The current high funding rate period, which began on November 12th, 2024, lasted 80 days before a 19-day pause, resuming for another 69 days,” the analysts highlighted. “Combined, this period spans 168 days, comparable to the 186 days observed from November 11th, 2020, to May 21st, 2021. Notably, Bitcoin purchases made on days when funding rates exceeded 10% yielded higher average returns over 30-day, 60-day, and 90-day time frames compared to purchases on days with lower funding rates.”
“However, the data also highlights a pattern of underperformance on longer time horizons,” they warned. “On average, purchases made on days when funding rates were above 10% began underperforming at the 180-day mark, with this trend becoming even more pronounced over 1-year and 2-year periods.”
“As market cycles typically span about four years, this pattern suggests that sustained high funding rates often correspond with cycle tops and may serve as early indicators of an overheated market vulnerable to longer-term downside,” they said.
“As of November 11th, Bitcoin has entered a new phase where funding rates again exceed 10%” Frankovitz and Sigel highlighted.
“This shift points toward stronger short- to medium-term momentum, as historically, elevated funding rates have been linked to higher 30-, 60-, and 90-day returns, reflecting heightened bullish sentiment and demand,” they said. “However, as funding rates remain elevated, we may move out of the phase where longer-term (1-2 year) returns are as favorable.”
To help gauge public sentiment and interest in crypto, the analysts looked at Google Trends data for the search term “crypto.”
“Historically, peaks in search interest have closely aligned with crypto market cap peaks,” they observed. “For example, all-time highs in search interest in May and November 2021 preceded significant market drawdowns: a two-month ~55% correction after the May peak and a ~12-month, ~75% bear market following the November peak.”
“Currently, search term popularity sits at just 34% of its May 2021 peak and slightly below the 37% local peak observed in March 2024, when Bitcoin reached its highest price of this cycle,” they noted. “This relatively low level of search interest suggests that Bitcoin and the broader crypto markets have not yet entered speculative mania, leaving room for further growth before reaching the levels of mainstream attention typically associated with market tops.”
With these metrics and others taken into account, Frankovitz and Sigel said there is still a long way to go in this bull cycle and expect Bitcoin’s price to double before it's over.
“Given the current pro-Bitcoin regulatory environment, we anticipate another period of high performance, reminiscent of the post-2020 election phase when sustained 10%+ funding rates drove a 260% gain over 186 days,” they concluded. “With Bitcoin currently trading near $90k, our $180k price target remains plausible, reflecting a potential cycle return of ~1,000% from the cycle’s trough to peak.”
