Barclays says peak prices for bitcoin are something of the past. Analysts at the bank compared the cryptocurrency to other speculative assets and say it’s only downhill from here.
There was a time where bitcoin’s price seemed to only move up. But in 2018 things have changed. The price of bitcoin has nearly halved this year, and Barclays sees it as unlikely to ever top its all-time high of $19,843, set in December.
“Unlike past peaks in Bitcoin prices, the survey evidence, based on our modeling, suggests that the speculative bubble in crypto currencies may have passed its peak,” the bank said as part of its annual Equity Gilt report.
The team of analysts says there’s a striking similarity between bitcoin’s rise in popularity and the spread of viruses like influenza: “Applying this model to speculative behavior in cryptocurrencies, it suggests that once a large enough share of the population susceptible to speculation becomes aware of and holders of crypto currencies, upward pressure on prices stalls,” the team writes.
“To the extent that holders’ attraction to Bitcoin was speculative — as our empirical analysis of historical prices suggests — those holders then become sellers, initiating an accelerating downward spiral.”
