(Kitco News) - As of midday Tuesday, Bitcoin was trading around $113,009, attempting to recover from a sharp sell-off that began over the weekend. In a wide-ranging interview with Kitco News, Swan Bitcoin CEO Cory Klippsten called the $1.8 billion deleveraging event in the crypto derivatives market “not a big deal,” reiterating his long-term price targets of $10,000 for gold and $1 million for Bitcoin.
The market turmoil saw over 407,000 traders liquidated in the largest such event of 2025. The sell-off created a stark divergence with traditional markets; Gold was trading near its record high of $3,800 an ounce, while the S&P 500 hovered just below its all-time high of 6,700.
Bitcoin vs. Crypto: ‘Completely Separate Asset Classes’
The crypto market rout was not evenly distributed. Traders lost over $500 million on leveraged Ethereum contracts versus $280 million on Bitcoin, according to data from Coinglass. Klippsten argued this is because Bitcoin is fundamentally different from other digital assets.
“I just think they're completely separate asset classes,” he stated, framing Bitcoin as a decentralized commodity. “The end game for them [altcoins] has always been a desire to be co-opted by Wall Street and the government and to become part of the system.”
The Corporate Darwinism
The interview also addressed the recent stress on the corporate treasury model, a strategy Klippsten calls “leveraged Bitcoin equities for Wall Street friends.” While analysis from K33 Research shows the stock premium for these companies is collapsing, Klippsten believes the movement is in its “gold rush stage” and is just beginning.
He argued that a powerful arbitrage exists for well-run public companies that can raise capital at a lower cost than Bitcoin’s projected growth rate. He pointed to the recent acquisition of Semler Scientific by Strive Inc. as a sign of healthy consolidation.
A New Era for SEC Regulation
Regarding the recent announcement of a proposed “innovation exemption” by SEC Chairman Paul Atkins, Klippsten offered a critical perspective. This proposed rule, which Atkins wants in place by year-end, would allow crypto firms to launch new products without complying with what he called “incompatible or burdensome” legacy rules.
This move is part of a broader crypto-friendly pivot under the Trump administration, which includes dropping previous enforcement cases and harmonizing rule-making with the CFTC. It also complements recent legislation like the GENIUS Act, which created a federal framework for stablecoins. Klippsten, however, described this pivot as a specific political victory for centralized projects.
“It's been an extremely successful regulatory push by the non-Bitcoin crypto guys over the last couple of years,” Klippsten said. “They've paid the right people and bought all the lobby firms and kind of successfully avoided the demise of that side of the industry.”
The Dampening Bitcoin Cycle
Klippsten provided a detailed breakdown of Bitcoin’s historical four-year cycles, noting that while the explosive gains are diminishing, the trend remains powerful. He detailed how the peak-to-trough returns have geometrically reduced each cycle: from a 550x gain in 2013, to 110x in 2017, to 22x in 2021.
Market data largely substantiates this trend of diminishing returns, a sign of a maturing asset class. Similarly, historical data show that the subsequent bear market drawdowns have become shallower over time, shrinking from approximately -94% in 2011 to -77% in the most recent cycle.
Klippsten noted that the current cycle has already broken the steep geometric reduction in gains, a positive sign. “What will tell me that we are maturing as an asset class is if the reduction from peak to trough after the next bull market peak is less than 70%,” he said, expressing hope for a “significantly shallower” bear market.
The Future of Gold and Bitcoin
Despite the short-term volatility, Klippsten sees a bright future for both hard assets. He argued that Bitcoin is a superior technology because it can transmit value across both time, like gold, and space, like fiat.
He stated that he believes the market caps of the two assets will likely cross “sometime in the second half of the 2030s.”
“I fully expect that we see gold at 10k an ounce in the next decade,” Klippsten concluded. “And I expect to see Bitcoin at a million in the next five, six years.”
To watch the full interview with Cory Klippsten, see the embedded video here.