A Goldman Sachs analyst is bullish on bitcoin. But is Goldman?

[PORTLAND] In a packet of slides sent to clients yesterday, Goldman Sachs Group technical analyst Sheba Jafari said that bitcoin could go up by 23 per cent in the short term, and that later the coin could go even higher.

That doesn't mean the bank is bullish on bitcoin, though.

The views "are not an 'official view' of Goldman Sachs," cautions a note introducing the 28-page packet of slides titled "The Charts That Matter Next Week." The bank sends such packets to clients weekly to highlight market trends to watch out for.

Based on technical analysis, investors should use retrenchment "as an opportunity to buy on weakness as long as it doesn't retrace further than the 9,084 low", Ms Jafari said. Bitcoin dropped 11 per cent since June 26, and is now at US$11,365. She predicted it could climb to as much as US$13,971.

The bitcoin chart was the last of 21 slides, offering technical analysis of everything from bond yields to gold. When Ms Jafari looked at bitcoin in late 2017, she cautioned traders against betting on a surge past US$8,000. The coin ended up hitting nearly US$20,000 about a month later before cratering.

Ms Jaffari used the Elliott Wave theory, created by the American accountant and author Ralph Nelson Elliott in the 1930s, which seeks to predict moves in financial markets by dividing past trends into five phases, or waves. The theory proposes that a five-wave gain or decline is followed by a three-wave corrective move in the opposite direction.

Goldman had previously considered opening a cryptocurrency trading desk, Bloomberg reported in 2017. It's also looking for a cryptocurrency project manager.

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