Bitcoin OG bets surprising sum on BTC hitting $100K before the halving

Blockstream CEO Adam Back, one of the crypto’s early pioneers, is pretty confident Bitcoin will hit an all-time high of over $100,000 before Bitcoin's halving in 2024 — and is willing to drop a million wagering on it.

In an Aug. 7 conversation on X (formerly known as Twitter), Back agreed to a bet with pseudonymous X user @Vikingobbitcoin that Bitcoin would reach $100,000 by March 31, 2024. Vinkingo said they believe it won’t happen until 2025.

The wagered date comes in roughly a month before the halving — which is currently on track for April 26 — as Back believes that the price will “probably” reach a new all-time high sooner than the actual date of the halving.

Bets on dramatic increases in the price of Bitcoin have attracted huge sums in the past, such as Balaji Srinivasan’s $1 million 90-day Bitcoin bet in March.

Beck’s also been bullish about Bitcoin in the past, saying in February that Bitcoin could reach $10 million by the sixth halving in 2032.

This time, Back is actually setting down hard-earned funds to back his most recent claim. Unfortunately, it’s a million satoshis, not U.S. dollars. That’s only $290 in current prices (or over $1,000 if Back’s prediction comes true).

A satoshi — “sat” for short — is the smallest divisible unit of Bitcoin, and there are 100 million sats to a single BTC. 

Thus, it’s a rather small bet for Back, given his net worth is estimated to be somewhere between $50 and $300 million.

However, in a response to Back’s original post, Jan3 CEO and fellow Bitcoiner Samson Mow said that he too expects a new all-time high for Bitcoin “pre halving, not post.”

Despite the small bet, it has attracted some snide replies in the responses — but still reflects a growing bullish trend on the price of Bitcoin among market commentators and analysts ahead of next year’s halving.

Meanwhile, in a Feb. 24 interview with Cointelegraph, Charles Edwards, the founder of Capriole Investments, said that the upcoming halving will see Bitcoin become the “hardest asset in the world” and predicted that the market is already in the early stages of a new bull cycle.