ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood recently declared that Bitcoin (BTC) will surpass the $1 million mark well before the anticipated year of 2030, which was her firm’s previous bull-case timeline.

This updated price target comes as a result of new institutional involvement and significant regulatory milestones, especially the US approval of the first spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

Revised outlook

In an interview with the New Zealand Herald on March 7, Wood shared that the introduction of spot ETFs marked a major turning point, signaling wider acceptance and integration of Bitcoin into the traditional financial system.

The SEC approval and the subsequent record-breaking performance of these ETFs have accelerated Bitcoin’s value appreciation timeline.

Wood pointed out that major wirehouses, like Morgan Stanley, Merryl Lynch, or Bank of America, have not yet joined the institutional push for Bitcoin, suggesting that Bitcoin’s price surge is still on the horizon. She said:

“No platform has approved Bitcoin yet, so all of this price action has happened before they approve it, and so we haven’t even begun.”

With the ongoing developments and the increased interest in spot ETFs, Wood stated that ARK Invest now considers the initial $1 million target by 2030 too conservative.

The company has revised its outlook to a figure significantly higher than the initial estimate, driven by new expectations for institutional participation, which could potentially more than double Bitcoin’s incremental price assumption.

Breaking ATH

Wood’s prediction is rooted in strong ETF inflows and the possibility of true price discovery if Bitcoin surpasses the $70,000 mark without encountering major technical issues like those Coinbase faced last week.

Wood said that Bitcoin’s recent price performance signifies the shifting tides of institutional waters, and she expects the flagship crypto to hit a market cap of $20 trillion over the coming years, which would bring its per token price to just under $1 million.

Her comments come amid the backdrop of Bitcoin’s unprecedented to a new all-time high weeks before the halving, which is expected in the latter half of April. The flagship crypto briefly set a new all-time high on March 5 and March 8 before experiencing an immediate and violent correction both times.

Bitcoin made another attempt to break $70,000 on March 10, but the weekend flows were not enough to push it over the threshold. BTC was trading at $69,400 as of press time, with a strong demand zone below the $69,000 mark and extreme sell pressure above the range.