Bernstein Still Aiming for $150K While $BTC Chills Above $63K Like Nothing Happened

Bitcoin held above $63,000 on Monday, trading around $63,207 and up 5.5% over seven days per CoinDesk data, after a holiday-weekend rally that briefly pushed the price toward $63,900 on CoinGecko. The token entered the third quarter at 21-month lows near $57,950 on July 1 before recovering the ground lost in late June, climbing from below $60,000 to above $63,000 over five trading sessions. BTC was last quoted at $63,420.53 in later reporting, with ether at $1,760 and solana near $80.77. Ether led major tokens on the week, rising about 12.4% to roughly $1,777, while dogecoin gained around 5.5% and BNB added a similar amount. Hyperliquid's HYPE rose 14.6% over seven days, XRP traded at $1.14 up 9.4%, and the CMC20 index of the top 20 assets climbed roughly 9%.

Analysts at investment bank Bernstein maintained their $150,000 year-end price target for Bitcoin even as the token changes hands near $63,836, calling the recent correction "rather comforting." "Crypto feels like it's growing up. We remain optimistic on Bitcoin long-term," the analysts wrote, while acknowledging that "our 2026 year-end $150K BTC price target appears ambitious in context of the market correction." Reaching the target would require Bitcoin to climb nearly 135% from current levels. Bernstein placed odds of the Clarity Act's passage by year-end at about 50% according to Polymarket, and said Strategy, the largest publicly traded holder of Bitcoin, is unlikely to become a forced seller, noting that the firm continues to maintain USD reserve coverage of ~17 months for dividend and interest expenses, with any reduction below 12 months requiring board authorization. Strategy sold $216 million worth of BTC last week to fund dividends, extending its USD reserve to more than $2.55 billion.

The rebound followed Thursday's U.S. Nonfarm Payrolls report, which showed the economy added just 57,000 jobs in June against roughly 113,000 expected, easing rate-hike fears and lowering Treasury yields. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh's comment that inflation risks have come down added to the friendlier macro turn. Spot Bitcoin ETFs snapped a 10-day run of redemptions with $223.5 million of net inflows on July 2, though the funds are still working through June's record outflows of $4.5 billion. ETH ETFs added about $15 million on July 1 and $29 million on July 2. Traders lost over $450 million in short positions across the derivatives market as Bitcoin broke through $62,000, with forced buybacks amplifying the squeeze. XRP rose 5.3% to $1.18 at one point over the weekend and nearly 10% on the week, overtaking USDC to become the fifth-largest cryptocurrency by market value at about $73 billion, even as onchain data showed XRP holders at their deepest average losses on record.

Altcoins outpaced Bitcoin during the rally, with LIT rising 50% over the week and 44% to $2.50 after its Robinhood integration, while Lighter's decentralized derivatives exchange accumulated $40 billion in 30-day trading volume. CoinMarketCap's Altcoin Season indicator climbed to 52/100, its highest in three months, though MORPHO and ADA each lost around 4% over 24 hours. Bitcoin miner TeraWulf struck a 20-year lease with Anthropic projected to bring in roughly $19 billion in revenue, sending WULF shares up nearly 14% to $24.05. Strategy's STRC jumped 21% to $87.87 and MSTR rebounded 21% to reclaim $100. Brent crude fell 0.6% to about $71.70 a barrel, the dollar strengthened against all major peers, and a rebound in semiconductor shares lost steam as Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix dragged South Korea's Kospi down 1.4%. Bitcoin's and ether's 30-day implied volatility indices BVIV and EVIV posted double-digit weekly declines, and open interest across BTC, ETH, SOL and XRP was largely unchanged over the past 24 hours as U.S. desks returned from the Independence Day holiday.