According to the bank’s latest note, Bitcoin’s base case sits at $181,000, while a bearish scenario puts it at $82,000. A bullish run could push Bitcoin to $231,000 within a year.
The base case of $181,000 would be a 52% rise. At the top end, Citi’s $231,000 figure is roughly 95% above today’s level. Those are big swings. They show how much uncertainty traders face.
At the same time, the bank highlighted continued interest from large investors and more institutional flows as reasons Bitcoin could climb.
The note also compared these targets with Citi’s earlier year-end calls — $132,000 for Bitcoin and $4,500 for Ethereum — and said it extended the timeline to a 12-month horizon that runs to October 2026.
Reports have disclosed that over the last 24 hours Bitcoin was up 2% and Ethereum rose 2.10%. Other big-name forecasts were mentioned alongside Citi’s view.
Tom Lee has put forward a much higher figure for Ethereum, forecasting $15,000 for ETH — a number well above Citi’s most bullish estimate.
According to Citi, Ethereum faces more unknowns. The bank set a bear case for ETH at $2,000, a base target at $5,400, and a bullish number at $7,300.
Those levels sit around a 65% rise from Ethereum’s current price of $4,480 in the best case. Citi explained that Ethereum’s ecosystem is still shifting, so it’s harder to predict how value will be shared across projects and staking participants.
Citi’s range is both a warning and a roadmap. It warns that prices can fall sharply — as shown by the $82,000 bear case for Bitcoin and $2,000 for Ethereum — but it also maps possible upside.
Featured image from Unsplash, chart from TradingView
