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Tom Lee says this could be the biggest cryptocurrency bull market in history, and argues that you're not optimistic enough. Is he right, or is this the most dangerous bet in the entire cycle ? In this video: why he says the "bull market" is here, the trillion-dollar wave of investment, his grand goal for Ethereum, and Bitmain's strategy.
First, who is Tom Lee? He was the chief equity strategist at JP Morgan for 15 years. In 2014, he left to start his own research firm, Fundstrat. That same year, he became the first major Wall Street strategist to begin covering Bitcoin. At the time, almost no one on Wall Street took it seriously. Today, he is also the chairman of Bitmain.
This is the largest company in the world by volume of assets in Ethereum. So when he talks about Ethereum, he is not an outside observer. He is one of its largest owners. On October 7, he took the stage at the Token 2049 conference in Singapore. Two days before, the cryptocurrency had hit what he calls a bottom, and he didn't play safe.
His timing consultant, he said, “expects Ethereum to easily break the 3,000 mark within the next few weeks. And finally: I know this is a bull market because the four-year cycle has bottomed out. So, if you check your clocks, the bottom was on October 5th. Thus, we are two days away from the bottom for cryptocurrencies.
In short, it's all in the math. We are in a " bull" market. But here's the thing. This could be the biggest bull market we've ever seen , okay? So I'm going to give you four reasons why this bull market is different from the others, okay? As Joe Lubin says, “You’re not optimistic enough. " Okay." Two bold statements in 40 seconds.
The four-year cycle bottomed on October 5, and this surge could be bigger than any before. Here is the context. Three days before his speech, Ethereum was trading around $2,700. So, only about 10% remained until 3000. This is not a crazy prediction. What happens next is crazy. So why does he think this cycle is different?
He gave four reasons, and the first starts with Wall Street itself. Chapter 1: Why the bull market is here. During each past crypto winter, the largest asset managers have remained silent. No one from the financial elite dared to publicly declare a “ bullish” crypto market . It was too risky for their reputation.
Lee says the situation has changed. So let's move on to his presentation. So, first of all, we have a full-fledged “ bullish” crypto market . There are too many signs that only occur during a bull market. So , let's begin . First, we have institutional support. I mean, it's not just Franklin who says a "bull" market is beginning.
This is Fidelity, BlackRock. In the past three crypto winter cycles, we have never seen institutions make such a statement. Franklin Templeton, Fidelity, BlackRock . These firms manage trillions of dollars for pension funds and families. When they say a "bull " market is starting, their clients listen, and they have a lot of money.
But the words of companies are one thing. Lee also brought charts, and his favorite is a line that traders have been following for decades. See what he says next. In past cycles, he says, you never saw big firms make statements like this. We also have a technical argument. Bitcoin is above its 200- day moving average.
This happened on August 19. Also on August 19, a “golden cross” occurred on Ethereum. You see, the last time Bitcoin crossed its 200- day line was last August, no, last April. But since 2010, Bitcoin has shown an average of 80% positive dynamics over the next 6 months. 200% profit. Ethereum has an average of 290%.
OK. Now you can see it on the graph because I can simplify it. These are other crossings above the 200- day line. Of the last nine crossings, eight were the start of a bull market. We also have positive flows in ETFs. You don't have positive flows into crypto in a "bear " market, only in a " bull" one.
Only in " bull" stock markets do you have positive capital inflows. Let's take a closer look at this . The 200-day moving average is the average closing price over the last 200 days. Traders use it as a dividing line. Above it, the trend is up. Below it, the trend is down. A “golden cross” is when the shorter 50-day moving average rises above the 200-day moving average.
This is one of the most tracked signals in the markets. Lee's numbers are impressive. Eight of the last nine crossovers have started a bull market, but the pattern is not a promise. One failure out of nine still means the signal may be false. And he also points to stable funds flowing into crypto funds.
And then comes the moment he calls irrefutable proof. This comes on the heels of a quarter that was tough for almost every market. Listen to this. And then we have irrefutable proof, because crypto assets in the third quarter of this year, from June to September, became the best macro asset by a wide margin.
AI company stocks fell that quarter. We were in very dire financial circumstances. We had a hawkish Fed policy, a spike in oil prices, rising global bonds, and tight financial conditions, but crypto performed better. This is what happens in a bull market. The crypto market ignores the fact that the Fed is hostile.
And finally, this is information from Tom Demark. He is one of our exclusive advisors. Thanks to his predictions, Bitmain saved at least $100 million this year. He is worth his weight in gold. And he says we are confident that Ethereum will continue to grow. He believes that Ethereum should easily surpass the 3000 mark in the near future.
This sentence ends right where this video began. $3,000 in a few weeks. Tom Demark is a renowned master of market timing. Its indicators are designed to identify the moment when a trend loses strength. Lee says Demark's predictions have saved Bitmain at least $100 million this year. That's why he trusts him with timing issues.
Now think about the conditions he describes. A hostile Fed, rising oil prices, rising bond yields , falling AI stocks— crypto usually crashes under these conditions. This is the first thing investors sell when money becomes scarce. Instead, he said, it outperformed all macro assets. So, this is his argument in favor of the "bulls." But Lee says the scale of this cycle is driven by something else.
They come from money that is not yet in crypto. Chapter Two: Money Wave . That's the idea. Banks and asset managers want to move stocks, bonds, and funds to the blockchain. This is called tokenization. Instead of settling a deal within two days, it takes seconds. Lee believes this is the biggest wave of all, and he has figures for how big it could get.
See what he says next. But here we are. An institutional wave awaits us. BlackRock and other asset managers want to tokenize everything on blockchains. Vlad Tenev of Robinhood, which I believe will become one of the top 10 financial institutions within a decade , says: “We are at the beginning of a supercycle.
Everything that works on traditional financial rails will be tokenized. "It's a huge wave." How big is this wave? Well, remember that the crypto market is $2 trillion . Today, there are $200 trillion in liquid assets outside the crypto market, growing by $7 trillion per year. If you've ever wondered if there's money to build data centers, there's $ 7 trillion in new money coming in every year.
Just the three largest markets—that's $160 trillion that could go into crypto. Remember, the ratio is 1 to 37. A trillion dollars invested in cryptocurrency would turn it into a market worth 37 trillion dollars. And , of course, a lot of this happens on Ethereum. BlackRock, JP Morgan, Robinhood—they are all building on Ethereum.
Ethereum definitely has a huge community. The number of developers today is equal to the rest of the community combined. So, this is a powerful wave. Let's take a closer look at his calculations. He says the cryptocurrency market is approximately $2 trillion. Outside of the crypto market, there are about $200 trillion in liquid assets.
This is 100 times more, hence its multiplier. He claims that $1 trillion in new money could add $37 trillion to value. This is his model, not a law of nature. The logic is that prices change more than the amount of incoming money, because only a small part of the supply participates in the bidding, but the exact ratio is only an estimate of it.
Nevertheless, the direction is clear. If even a small fraction of that 200 trillion goes online, cryptocurrency will look tiny in comparison, and he says a second wave is coming. This wave is not coming from the banks. It comes from families. The second difference of this “bull” market is that there is a huge redistribution of wealth.
I don't think people have talked about it enough. But Vlad says it's a hundred trillion over the next 10 years. We can observe this. This is data from the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS). During the last cryptocurrency bull market, $400 billion in wealth was inherited. In the next cycle, this amount will likely approach 1.5–2 trillion.
This is when baby boomers or older people pass away and millennials receive the inheritance. This capital is flowing from bonds to stocks and cryptocurrency. Huge, simply colossal tides. A significant portion will come from private equity and private debt, at least 12 trillion. So consider this a huge purchasing power.
And of course, I think that explains why we're seeing such extraordinary performance. I mean, amazing performance. The great redistribution of wealth is a reality. Baby boomers own a huge share of America's wealth. When that money passes to their children, the way it is invested changes. Younger investors own more stocks and cryptocurrencies.
They have fewer bonds. Lee's argument is simple. During the last bull market, inherited money was just a small trickle. In this cycle, he says, it could become a real flood. And for a flood, you don't need to invest a lot in cryptocurrency to change the price. Now his story becomes personal. He went to dinner with old friends he met 10 years ago when he first started covering Bitcoin .
What they told him is a lesson for every investor. Listen to this. So, the last point I want to emphasize is: let's say you're bullish on ETH, and I think you should be. You should be optimistic about L1 networks. I recently had dinner in Taiwan with some people I met 10 years ago when I first started researching Bitcoin .
So imagine, 10 years ago, a bitcoin was less than a thousand, and today a bitcoin is worth 80,000. So these venture capitalists , when I had dinner with them, I expected them to be living on private jets, because at the very least, if Bitcoin had given an 80x return, their venture investments could have been a hundred or a thousand times more profitable .
But here's what they said. They said their venture profits were good, but they regretted not simply buying Bitcoin. Of course? And that's what I'm telling you now. You want to have maximum exposure to Bitcoin, Ethereum, and even Solana in this cycle. I believe that L1 networks will capture a significant portion of the value.
But there is a way to outperform L1 —it’s by buying digital asset treasuries, and Bitmain is well- positioned to outperform this cycle. I want to make this point very clear. 80 times in 10 years. This is what Bitcoin has done, according to his calculations. And these were professional venture capitalists.
They made a living by choosing startups. They had access to insider information, and they still regret not just buying Bitcoin. But notice how he concludes this passage. He says there is a way to beat the coins themselves by buying digital asset treasuries. And yes, that means his own company. We need to be careful here.
Lee is the chairman of Bitmain, so everything that follows is also an advertisement for his shares. That doesn't make it wrong, but keep that in mind. Chapter 3, the goal for Ethereum. Bitmain owns more Ethereum than any other company on Earth. The latest update from October 4th shows just over 6 million ETH.
This is 4.9% of all existing Ethereum. Now Lee explains how he wants the stock to outperform Ethereum itself, and puts a price on it . See what he says next. So, here are three ways we do it. First—Bitmain maintains maximum exposure to Ethereum in this bull market cycle, okay? Here is the price of Ethereum.
It has been consolidating for 5 years. You know, the longer the base, the more powerful the breakout will be . The last time Ethereum consolidated, it grew 227 times. And before that, even earlier, it had grown 54 times. I think, considering tokenization, AI, everything I talked about, data and wealth redistribution, it's a minimum of 25x, okay?
So what does this mean for Bitmain's share price? The stock is now worth 26. And Bitmain is 90% correlated with Ethereum. Well, if Ethereum hits 22,000, which I consider the lower target, Bitmain's stock price will go from 26 to 300–500. This is a huge leap. If Ethereum reaches 62,000 , Bitmain's share price will be between 1,200 and 1,500.
But you see, we're really focused on making sure Bitmain's share price has maximum exposure to Ethereum. Let's compare his numbers with the real price. Three days before his speech, Ethereum was worth around $2,700. His lower target is 22,000. That's about eight times higher. His upper target, 62,000, is about 23 times higher.
Now look at the math of stocks. From $26 to $300—that's more than 11 times. Up to 1,500 is almost 60 times. These are goals, not facts. No one knows if Ethereum will get there. His argument is based on this 5- year base. The longer the price moves sideways, the bigger the breakout can be . So why does he think he can break through this time?
He gives two more reasons. The first is AI, and he believes that most people still underestimate how much of an impact it can have. And lastly, there is a new story, you can see it at this conference and from the exhibitors. Crypto is an important story about the development of AI. So, AI is, of course, a megatrend.
But everyone thinks it's just about semiconductors, memory, and bottlenecks, but that's not the case. As semiconductors and memory adjusted, emerging sector stocks outperformed them. " Magnetic SIM card", software and crypto. A16Z, Marc Andreessen, and I know your next panel will have someone from A16Z.
They see agent payments as a great combination of AI and crypto, because AI agents will handle money. They might carry a Visa card in their wallet, but it will most likely be a crypto wallet. And we know that non-humans are becoming the dominant source of traffic. In fact, they are also the largest consumers of crypto and computing tokens in AI today.
These are other agents. And we have to be careful because agents can now bypass CAPTCHAs. We can't even tell who is who. So we need to keep people "in the loop." This is where crypto, finality, smart contracts, and law enforcement come into play. Agent payments sound like science fiction, but the idea is simple.
An AI agent that books a flight or buys data has to pay somehow. He can't come to the bank and open an account, but he can have a crypto wallet, and smart contracts allow payment to be made only after the work is done, without human intervention. This is the connection that Lee sees between AI and crypto—millions of machines paying each other 24/7.
His second reason is supply, and it comes from the type of companies that were almost nonexistent in the last cycle. Digital asset treasuries. These are public companies whose main task is to buy and hold a single coin. Strategy does this with Bitcoin. Bitmain is doing this with Ethereum. Lee says this changes the price response when buyers return .
That's why these treasury companies are important. In a bull market, this means they will support the underlying blockchain. Why is that? Well, because they're withdrawing the offer. Ethereum currently owns 7% of the crypto supply. Bitcoin is currently owned by 6.5 %. Solana - up to 3%. But look at Hyperliquid.
I mean, it's a very successful chain and project, but part of that is because Hyperliquid-dot owns 14% of the supply. When you remove an offer , take it off the market , and then a bull market occurs, you know what? The price will increase significantly more. And Ethereum still has the largest share among the " big three"—7% of the supply.
This, you know, didn't exist during the last "bull" market. That's why, if you think about the growth potential of ETH, I think you're underestimating how far it can go. The logic here is basic supply and demand. When coins are in the treasury, they are off the market. So when new buyers arrive, they have less to sell to.
The price must rise to find a seller. Bitmain's own numbers show the scale. It holds about 4.9% of all ETH, and over 5 million of its coins are staked. This means they are locked in and receive rewards on the network, but there is a downside. If the Treasury has to sell , this supply will flood the market again.
Lee's answer to this risk is a hard limit. Chapter 4, Bitmain strategy. The company's goal is to own 5 percent. So where are we in relation to this 5%? Well, this is our ETH accumulation over the last 15 months. Of course? And you see that now we have 6 million. It took a little over a year. We thought it would take 5 years.
It took a little over a year. More importantly, we did all of this in the middle of a bear market. Of course? So we bought ETH until no one wanted to buy it. We were happy to buy it cheap. We bought a lot at 1,500. But this is in the middle of a "bear" market. And now we will stop. We only need another 100,000 ETH to reach 5%.
Of course? But we will stop there. The reason we're stopping is because of this schedule. We bought all this in a " bear" market. Of course? So, actually I think we helped set a bottom for ETH. We protected ETH from falling because we bought. But now we have finished accumulating before the 25x growth.
So, if we have a hard limit of 5%, that means we will outperform ETH during the uptrend. Yes? Because you don't need to worry that we're trying to raise capital. So, Bitmain says it will stop buying at 5%. This means that new shares will not be sold solely to fund new ETH . And that's the essence of it.
When the Treasury continues to sell shares to buy coins, it dilutes the holdings of those who already own them. Stop buying and each stock will retain more profit. He also says they bought a lot near $1,500. At a price of 2700, these coins have increased by about 80%. Buying when no one needed it is something he is proud of.
And there is another tool he used. When the shares became cheap, Bitmain bought them back. Listen to this. Bitmain We did other things too. We bought back shares to protect shareholders. In fact, we executed the largest crypto ransom in history. But here's what's interesting. This is Bitmain's stock price this year.
As you know, we hired Tom DeMarco. We decided that our shares had become too cheap right here. On July 14th, we began our buybacks. We did it for about a month, spent $350 million. You see, we helped protect the stock from falling. And as soon as we stopped, by the way, the stock went up even more. That's what buyouts are supposed to do— protect shareholders.
His update says that 21 million shares were repurchased in 2026 alone. Lee calls it the largest crypto-treasury buyout in history. Buybacks can support stocks, but they also use up cash that could have been used to buy more coins. Lee clearly believed that his own shares were a better deal at the time.
And thanks to DeMark's timing, he said, it worked. So, what is one lesson he wants the audience to remember? He could talk about his company all day, but I want to leave you with this: big money is not made in buying and selling, but in waiting. From the great Charlie Munger. He's a real master of " hodl", you know?
So, to sum up, this is the biggest crypto bull market and you are not optimistic enough. Thank you. So, here is the main conclusion. Lee's arguments rest on four pillars: large institutions are in the business, charts are giving bullish signals, trillions of dollars are waiting to be transferred on the network, and treasuries are blocking the offer.
Some of this is data, some is predictions, and some comes from the man who runs the largest Ethereum vault on the planet. You should weigh all three, but Munger's rule applies in any case. Big money is made by waiting, not by chasing every headline. So is Tom Lee right, or is this peak optimism? Write to me in the comments.
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