Written by: Blockchain Knight
Recent Galaxy research shows that, when calculated with 2020 dollar purchasing power, the actual value of Bitcoin is approximately 99,848 dollars, not reaching the truly significant milestone of 100,000 dollars.
This contrast does not deny the rise of Bitcoin, but reveals the quiet rewriting of milestones in fiat currency valuation due to inflation. For this institution-led cycle, this difference is of great practical significance.
The core impact of inflation is to change the real value of the dollar. Over the past few years, the purchasing power of the dollar has significantly declined, and the current nominal price needs to be multiplied by 0.8 to convert to 2020 dollars.
This means that the $100,000 of 2025 is only equivalent to $80,000 of 2020. To match the purchasing power of $100,000 in 2020, Bitcoin's nominal price needs to approach $125,000, and the peak of this cycle happens to be close to that area, intensifying the controversy.
For institutions, actual returns are the core evaluation standard. Institutions like pension funds do not care about nominal gains but focus more on returns after inflation, which is also a necessary test for Bitcoin's advancement to macro assets.
Current CPI data chaos adds more variables. In 2025, the Bureau of Labor Statistics suspended CPI publication due to funding interruptions, and different statistical criteria may yield slightly different results, complicating the judgment of actual value.
Market reactions confirm this value divergence. Bitcoin fell sharply by 30% after peaking in October, and the asset management scale of the U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF dropped from the peak of $169.5 billion on October 6 to $120.7 billion on December 4.
However, on-chain data shows that the foundation remains solid, with Bitcoin's actual market value reaching a historical high of $1.125 trillion this year, reflecting a strengthening base of long-term holders.
Future trends should focus on three directions: first, changes in monetary policy that bring nominal value back; second, high inflation that causes nominal new highs to become hollow numbers, with rising real yields exacerbating pressure; third, ETF demand accelerating the breakthrough of resistance levels adjusted for inflation.
Citi predicts that Bitcoin's basic scenario for 2026 is $143,000 and the optimistic scenario exceeds $189,000, with the core variable still being ETF fund flows.
Essentially, inflation has made Bitcoin's fiat currency milestone a moving target. Bitcoin is often seen as a hedge against inflation, yet inflation rewrites the landmark fiat currency milestone, which is quite ironic.
Next time we face an integer milestone, the market should pay more attention not to the number itself, but to the actual purchasing power behind it, which is key to whether Bitcoin can truly enter a new era.
