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Harvard Professor Who Predicted Bitcoin Crash to $100 Says Regulators Were Too Lax
Kenneth Rogoff reflects that he underestimated BTC's role in the underground economy, which has put a floor under the cryptocurrency's price.
Updated Aug 21, 2025, 5:08 p.m. Published Aug 21, 2025, 8:21 a.m.
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What to know:
- Kenneth Rogoff, an economics professor at Harvard, predicted in 2018 that bitcoin would be worth $100 rather than $100,000 in a decade.
- Bitcoin's price has surpassed $100,000, contrary to Rogoff's initial prediction.
- Rogoff says he underestimated BTC's role in the underground economy and overestimated regulators' ability to restrain its use.
In 2018, Kenneth S Rogoff, professor of economics at Harvard University and a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, predicted bitcoin was more likely to be worth $100 than $100,000 in a decade.
In reality, bitcoin's price rose above $100,000 this year, a 10-fold increase from March 2018's sub-$10,000 level when Rogoff predicted the crash.
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On Tuesday, with bitcoin hovering around $113,000, Rogoff reflected on how he had missed the mark, saying he had been "far too optimistic about the U.S. coming to its senses regarding sensible cryptocurrency regulation."
In a post on X, Harvard economist Ken Rogoff expressed said he'd expected policymakers to adopt a firm stance to curb the use of cryptocurrencies in tax evasion and illegal activities. He was, indirectly, criticizing the regulatory environment as being less than prudent and allowing cryptocurrencies like BTC to flourish in ways he did not anticipate.
Rogoff underestimated how bitcoin would compete with fiat currencies to serve as the transaction medium of choice in the 20 trillion-dollar global underground economy.
"This demand puts a floor on its price, as I discuss at length in my new book Our Dollar, Your Problem," Rogoff said.
He also flagged a "blatant conflict of interest," with regulators "holding hundreds of millions (if not billions) of dollars in cryptocurrencies seemingly without consequence."
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