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Ether Could Hit $8K by End of 2026: Standard Chartered

Emerging uses for the Ethereum network in gaming and tokenization are among the drivers of what could be a 5X gain in ether's price over the next three years, said the bank.

Oct 11, 2023, 4:24 p.m. 1 min read
Standard Chartered makes the bullish case for ether (Lieve Ransijn/ Unsplash)

The price of ether [ETH] has the potential to reach $8,000 by the end of 2026 versus its current level just below $1,,600, writes Geoff Kendrick, Head of FX Research, West, and Digital Assets Research at Standard Chartered Bank.

While Ethereum's dominant uses currently are non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and decentralized finance (DeFi), said Kendrick, an evolution towards gaming and tokenization should add "significant demand."

"Importantly, this should provide ‘proof of concept’ examples in which real-world industries come on-chain to exploit the benefits of Ethereum over their existing setups," he added. "We expect significant developments on these fronts by 2025-26."

In the shorter term, said Kendrick, the bitcoin [BTC] halving in April 2024 "should help lift all boats," and he sees ether hitting $4,000 by the end of next year.

Looking even longer into the future, Kendrick sees the $8,000 level as "a stepping stone" to the bank's "structural" valuation estimate of $26,000-$35,000.

Read more: Bitcoin Could Rise to $120K by End-2024: Standard Chartered

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