From cointelegraph by Tom Mitchelhill

CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju says Bitcoin may end the year under $59,000, citing an overheated futures market as one of the primary reasons for an end-of-year tumble.

In a Nov. 9 post to X, Ki said he expects Bitcoin to close the year at $58,974 and asked others to speculate on the yearly close, adding that he’d pay 0.1 BTC to the person with the closest answer. 

“I expected corrections as BTC futures market indicators overheated, but we’re entering price discovery, and the market is heating up even more,” Ki said. 

“If correction and consolidation occur, the bull run may extend; however, a strong year-end rally could set up 2025 for a bear market, [in my opinion].”

“Hope I’m wrong,” he added in his original post. 

Bitcoin is currently showing a record level of open interest — a measure of how many active positions are open on Bitcoin derivatives like futures and options — at nearly $50 billion, per CoinGlass data. 

Still, Collective Shift CEO Ben Simpson told Cointelegraph that while a pullback to $58,000 was always possible, he considered it to be “very unlikely” by the end of this year. 

“With the Trump election, interest rates coming down, the potential for quantitative easing starting up in the future, and getting relatively consistent days of a billion dollars Bitcoin ETF volume, more people are catching on,” he said. 

The price of Bitcoin has surged 17.3% in the last seven days, briefly rallying to notch another new all-time high of $81,570 on Nov. 10.

Related: Bitcoin ripe for ‘major leg down’ as BTC price nears $80K — Trader

Last week, the cohort of 11 spot Bitcoin ETFs witnessed a combined $1.6 billion in net inflows, with Nov. 7 standing as the largest inflow day on record, according to data from Farside Investors. 

“When you’ve got a limited supply asset like Bitcoin and the amount of demand that’s coming in, the space is only going one way,” said Simpson.

“In previous cycles, 20-30% corrections are completely normal, but the slow grind higher for Bitcoin has been so exciting to see because the pullbacks are only between five and six percent so far,” Simpson added. 

“The market structure is looking super strong. There’s always the potential to dip suddenly but I think we keep moving higher.”