New York — Bitcoin BTC$78,937.14 may be locked in a difficult market now, but long-term investors should be looking far ahead, according to Pantera Capital CEO Dan Morehead.

“In 10 years from now, bitcoin will massively outperform gold. That’s very obvious,” Morehead said during a panel with Bitmine Immersion (BMNR) Chairman Tom Lee at the Ondo Summit in New York City on Tuesday.

“Paper money is being debased at 3% every year, and that’s called stable money," said Morehead. "Now, over your lifetime, that’s 90%,” he continued. “So it’s totally rational to invest in something with a fixed quantity, like gold or bitcoin.”

While Bitcoin and gold have traded in cycles, Morehead noted, investor attention tends to rotate. “Gold got way ahead, but they do alternate back and forth,” he said, adding that total ETF inflows into both assets have been roughly equal over the past few years.

An equally bullish Tom Lee threw some shade on the four-year cycle, which some believe is driving the current downturn. “I don’t think it’s a four-year cycle,” he said, citing diverging metrics like Ethereum’s ETH$2,325.24 rising activity and accelerated deleveraging that happened during October 2025's crypto crash. “That was a bigger wipeout than November 2022,” Lee argued.

Morehead also said institutional exposure to crypto remains minimal, despite recent developments such as the launch of bitcoin ETFs. “All these $100 billion alt firms have zero bitcoin or crypto, and that’s why I’m still so bullish,” he said. “You can’t have a bubble when the median holding for institutional investors… is literally 0.0.”

According to Morehead, the reasons that once kept large institutions away are disappearing. “The list of reasons to say no to crypto used to be super long… They’re pretty much all crossed off,” he said, pointing to improving custodial options and regulatory clarity.

He argued that blockchain’s 80% annual returns over 12 years and its low correlation with stocks make it a rare asset class that offers both high growth and portfolio diversification. “There’s never been a better asset class in history.”

Lee agreed that blockchain infrastructure is quietly becoming embedded in the financial system. “I think crypto starts to become invisibly more part of everyone's lives,” he said, pointing to stablecoins, tokenized assets and crypto-powered neobanks as examples. “People may actually start to use crypto without realizing they're actually using crypto.”

As for regulatory shifts, both speakers said the U.S. is at a turning point. “It is night and day to have clarity,” Morehead said. “We’re going from such an incredibly negative point to now I would call it neutral… and hopefully United States will soon be neutral.”

Looking ahead, Morehead sees multiple catalysts, including a possible “global arms race” to acquire bitcoin among both U.S. allies and adversaries. “Countries… will realize, like China, it’s super crazy to have 1,000 years of your life savings stored in an asset that [Treasury Secretary] Scott Bessent can cancel. That is crazy. It’s way smarter to buy bitcoin.”