"Bitcoin $250,000? Now 'Maybe'"…Tom Lee sharply lowers his outlook

Tom Lee, chairman of BitMine, has effectively withdrawn his year-end Bitcoin forecast of '$250,000', and market expectations appear to be cooling rapidly. He said the likelihood that Bitcoin could recover above $100,000 within the year is still high, but he stepped back from whether it would break the all-time high, using the conditional term "maybe".

According to a Cointelegraph report on the 27th (local time), Tom Lee said in a CNBC interview that Bitcoin could escape the current bearish trend and recover to the $100,000 level by year-end, but he no longer seemed confident about his repeatedly emphasized 'year-end $250,000' forecast. He mentioned recent market volatility and said only that a re-break of the all-time high of $125,100 "is possible".

Since early this year, Tom Lee has presented aggressive forecasts based on a high liquidity environment and structural demand, but major industry figures such as Galaxy Digital's Mike Novogratz warned from the time that the necessary conditions were unrealistic. In fact, Bitcoin faced clear downward pressure after October when, immediately following President Donald Trump's announcement of a 100% tariff on Chinese goods, $19 billion of liquidations occurred across the market.

Tom Lee emphasized, however, that "Bitcoin produces most of its annual gains within 10 trading days," and that extreme timing volatility must be taken into account. According to this widely shared industry analysis, investors who miss Bitcoin's '10 up days' miss most of the annual returns. In fact, Bitcoin's 2024 gain of 52% occurred in just 10 days, while the remaining periods averaged a –15% return.

Bitcoin is currently barely back in the low $90,000s. It rebounded after six consecutive days below $90,000, but many say it is too early to view the downtrend that began on October 10 as fully resolved. Historically this month is a period with a high probability of Bitcoin strength, but the market remains cautious.

Meanwhile, Tom Lee's forecasting record has been mixed. He argued in 2018 that Bitcoin could reach $125,000 in 2022, but the high at the time was only $17,172. Conversely, in 2017 he offered a conservative forecast that Bitcoin would reach $20,000 by 2022, and that materialized in 2020.