Citi raises bitcoin target to $113,000 after cutting it twice

Citigroup raised its 12-month forecast for bitcoin to $113,000 from $82,000, and for ether to $3,028 from $2,240, in a note dated 30 September 2026, Reuters and Fortune reported on 1 October. The bank now expects $5 billion of ETF inflows over the next 12 months, after cutting that assumption to zero at the end of June.

Bitcoin stood at $86,501.55 at 13:57 UTC on 2 October, according to Chainlink’s BTC/USD price feed, so Citi’s new target is 30.6% above that price. The ether target of $3,028 is 10.7% above ether’s Chainlink price of $2,734.13 at 14:12 UTC.

Citi raised both targets by more than a third

Citi lifted its bitcoin target by 37.8% and its ether target by 35.2% in the note dated 30 September 2026. The bank cited stronger crypto activity, a supportive macroeconomic backdrop and a resumption of ETF inflows, Reuters reported.

Both coins had already passed Citi’s June calls. At $86,501.55 on 2 October, bitcoin stood 5.5% above the $82,000 target, and ether at $2,734.13 stood 22.1% above the $2,240 target. The new bitcoin target is $1,000 above the $112,000 Citi set in March, while the ether target sits below March’s $3,175.

Why did Citi raise its forecasts?

Citi cited stronger crypto activity, a supportive macroeconomic backdrop and a resumption of ETF inflows when it raised both forecasts, Reuters reported on 1 October 2026. Citi analyst Alex Saunders said the increase “draws from all three components of our process: activity, macro, and ETF flows”, Yahoo Finance reported. According to Fortune, the bank also pointed to the US Treasury’s decision to buy back longer-dated bonds and a weaker dollar, and said the SEC’s moves to write rules for the industry helped calm investors’ concerns. Citi expects crypto inflows to resume at a slower but steadier pace as advisers and brokerages gradually add bitcoin to their allocations, Reuters reported.

Citi also tied the move to Washington: “The Clarity Act’s failure narrowed the path to a market-structure bill, yet spurred Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) rule announcements that dampened negative sentiment,” it said, according to Reuters. The bill fell 49 votes to 50 on 15 September 2026, short of the 60 needed to end debate on taking it up, according to the Senate’s roll call.

Citi’s strategists discussed the rally on the bank’s Research @ Citi podcast, recorded on 21 September. Bitcoin “completely ignored the hawkish Fed”, said Dirk Willer, Citi’s global head of macro strategy and asset allocation. Saunders, its head of global quant macro strategy, answered: “The CLARITY Act failed in the Senate, failed to get enough votes for cloture. And yet we’ve seen a rally in price.” He added that, “despite the failure of the CLARITY Act, we’ve seen new rules and we think that the SEC will still go ahead with rulemaking around crypto markets, which has generated more interest.” Saunders also noted that bitcoin was trading above its 200-day moving average, and that trend-following “works particularly well in crypto markets”.

Money is flowing back into bitcoin funds

Citi now assumes $5 billion of ETF inflows over the next 12 months, up from zero in its note of 30 June 2026 and $10 billion before that, according to Reuters. In June the bank said ETF flows, “an important driver of prices, have turned negative recently”, and put the year’s outflows from bitcoin ETFs at about $3.3 billion.

Spot bitcoin ETFs lost nearly $7 billion in May and June, then took in more than $2 billion in September, Fortune reported, citing data from SoSoValue. Citi’s new figure is half its assumption from before June, and the bank expects the money to arrive gradually through advisers and brokerages.

Citi cut its target twice before raising it

Citi cut its 12-month bitcoin target to $112,000 from $143,000 in a note dated 16 March 2026, then to $82,000 in a note dated 30 June, before raising it to $113,000 on 30 September. In March the bank pointed to slow progress on US crypto legislation, Reuters reported. In June it cited weakening investor appetite, negative ETF flows and stalled legislation, and cut its ether target to $2,240 from $3,175.

The March note also set a recession bear case of $58,000 for bitcoin and a bull case of $165,000. Bitcoin fell below the bear case within four months: its lowest Chainlink price of 2026 was $57,783.48 at 01:13 UTC on 1 July, the day Reuters reported the June cut. The June note had already lowered the bear case to $53,000.

How far does bitcoin have to climb?

Bitcoin needs to rise 30.6% from $86,501.55, its Chainlink price at 13:57 UTC on 2 October 2026, to reach Citi’s $113,000 target, and ether needs 10.7% to reach $3,028. Both prices come from Chainlink’s feeds on Ethereum: the BTC/USD round of 13:57 UTC and the ETH/USD round of 14:12 UTC.

Both coins have won back most of this year’s losses. Bitcoin and ether rallied nearly 40% and 68% in the three months to 1 October, Reuters reported. At Chainlink’s 2 October prices, bitcoin stood 1.2% below the $87,526.32 at which it started 2026, and ether 8.0% below its starting $2,970.64.

Ether has the shorter way to go. When Citi cut its ether target in March, it said ether “will be especially sensitive to user activity metrics, which have been weak recently, but stablecoin and tokenization trends may increase interest and usage”, according to Reuters. Stronger crypto activity is among the reasons Citi gave for the 30 September rise.

Citi’s new bitcoin call also sits above anything bitcoin has reached this year. The highest Chainlink price of 2026 was $97,726.80 at 17:13 UTC on 14 January, and $113,000 is 15.6% above it.