Tom Lee: ETH is like BTC in 2017, it will experience a rise in the future.

Source: Bankless; Translated by: Jinse Finance

Note: In the past month or two, the Ethereum treasury company BitMine has been quite popular on Wall Street. On August 6, 2025, Bankless interviewed BitMine Chairman Tom Lee. Tom Lee expressed his views on several issues, including BitMine's goal of purchasing 5% of the total ETH supply, the reasons for the rise of Ethereum treasuries, who is buying Ethereum treasury companies, the source of the mNAV premium in crypto treasury companies, why the price of ETH is still below $4000 despite the large buy of ETH by the treasury, ETH price prediction for the end of 2025, and whether there is a bubble in crypto treasuries.

In terms of prices that people are particularly concerned about, Tom Lee believes that ETH is experiencing a moment similar to BTC in 2017, where Wall Street is beginning to support ETH. He predicts that ETH will achieve exponential growth in the future, just as Bitcoin has in the past five years. He also made a prediction for the ETH price: in the short term, ETH should at least rebound to $4000, and it is reasonable for ETH to reach $7000 or even $12000 or $15000 before the end of 2025. This is compiled by Golden Finance for readers' reference.

Quick Purchase of 830,000 ETH on BitMine

Bankless: In this episode of the podcast, we have Tom Lee, the legendary Wall Street investor and chairman of the newly established ETH treasury company BitMine. I really didn't expect Tom Lee to create an ETH treasury company in 2025. BitMine currently holds 833,000 ETH, which is close to 1% of the total ETH supply. BitMine is the largest publicly listed ETH treasury company in the world. How do you feel about that?

Tom Lee: We acted very quickly, as BitMine announced the start on June 30 and completed the transaction by July 8. In the 27 calendar days following the completion of the transaction, we acted at a very high speed to quickly acquire these ETH.

I think this is important because MicroStrategy has proven its 30 times return. The shift for MicroStrategy occurred in August 2020 when its stock price was $13, while Bitcoin skyrocketed from $11,000 to now $120,000, but its treasury strategy has brought an additional 20 times return on top of that. This is why it has achieved a total return of 30 times.

Ethereum is one of the biggest macro trades of the next decade. So we want to act quickly because we want to acquire as much ETH as possible at $3,500 or other prices before ETH achieves exponential growth like Bitcoin has in the past 5 years.

The Rise of Ethereum Treasury Companies

Bankless: Unlike MicroStrategy, when you launched BitMine and announced the execution of the ETH treasury strategy, other ETH treasury companies followed suit, such as Joseph Lubin's Sharpink Gaming. Now there is a large number of ETH treasury companies. Do you know of other companies that followed suit? What's going on here? Why does it seem like all of this is happening at the same time?

Tom Lee: Perhaps great minds think alike. For a long time, there were only Bitcoin treasury companies, then a few Solana treasury companies and Hype treasury companies. Sharplink is the first Ethereum treasury company, announced in May. We are behind after SharpLink, so we are lagging.

I think Ethereum itself is very meaningful as a treasury.

• First, if you have a positive attitude towards ETH itself, then this is the reason to execute the Ethereum treasury. Especially in comparison to ETFs, the treasury strategy allows you to accumulate more ETH.
• Second, because of ETH staking and proof of stake, these treasury companies are essentially infrastructure companies. In return, they receive native staking rewards, which makes them real businesses. For example, BitMine currently holds over 3 billion dollars worth of ETH, which can earn over 3% in native staking rewards, which is essentially net income.
• Thirdly, creating scarcity is very important. The story of BitMine is a story of scarcity. Because we have a very clear strategy to try to acquire 5% of ETH. We have a clean balance sheet. This is a huge advantage. Moreover, the stock liquidity is very good. BitMine has a daily trading volume of 1.6 billion dollars, making it the 42nd most liquid stock in today's U.S. stock market. In fact, BitMine's daily trading volume is similar to that of Uber. Despite BitMine's market cap being around 4 billion dollars, Uber's market cap is 184 billion dollars.

5% Target of Total Ethereum Supply

Bankless: Let's talk about the number 5%. 5% of the total supply of ETH is approximately 6 million ETH. You acted very, very quickly, reaching 833,000 in about 4 weeks. Is BitMine serious about 5%? 5% of Ethereum is approximately $20 billion at current market prices. How exactly do you plan to reach 5%? Do you have an execution plan to achieve that 5%? If so, what does that plan look like?

Tom Lee: MicroStrategy currently holds 3.2% of the circulating supply of BTC. MicroStrategy aims to acquire at least one million bitcoins, which is about 5%. Keep in mind that once MicroStrategy owns one million bitcoins, they will have a sovereign put option. They have strategic importance to the Bitcoin ecosystem. What I mean is, if the U.S. wants to create a strategic Bitcoin reserve, it may be difficult for the U.S. to purchase one million bitcoins on the open market, because once they announce it, sellers will reduce their offerings, and Bitcoin could immediately rise to one million dollars. MicroStrategy might be an easier way for someone/country to acquire one million bitcoins. I call it a sovereign put option.

MicroStrategy achieved 3% over 5 years. So they were basically purchasing Bitcoin at a value of 16 cents per share every day for the past 5 years. BitMine has been increasing by about 80 cents to 1 dollar per share in Ethereum every day since its establishment. Its speed is about 12 times that of MicroStrategy. So we expect to reach 5% at a speed 12 times that of MicroStrategy. But this makes sense because everything BitMine does is 100% compliant and legitimate. Ethereum is a legitimate and compliant blockchain. Everything BitMine does keeps every aspect of its operation within the United States. So it aligns very well with the substantial staking of ETH that Wall Street and the U.S. government hope to see. Equally important is that ETH itself will be where most of Wall Street's on-chain financialization takes place.

Someone on Twitter put forward the idea that Wall Street betting on ETH is akin to gamers/gaming companies buying Nvidia. This is exactly Wall Street's thinking; if Wall Street wants to tokenize real-world assets from the currency market to the dollar to stocks, they would want to own ETH itself. They hope that those staking ETH are actually real entities trying to drive the goals of Ethereum forward. So I think BitMine plays an important role by staking ETH.

Bankless: Tom, if BitMine's current rate is 12 times that of MicroStrategy, it will basically reach 5% in one to two years, which would be an incredible pace. Do you think Ethereum has similar sovereign put options like Bitcoin? That is, one day the U.S. government or another sovereign state comes to you and says, "Hi, BitMine, we noticed you have a lot of ETH. We want to buy ETH for the U.S. Treasury and the Federal Reserve to put on our balance sheet. We know you have a lot. Can we do an over-the-counter trade?" Do you think that's a possibility?

Tom Lee: What you just said is actually rational and makes sense. But BitMine's goal is not to have a put option. If Wall Street, Genius Act, and the SEC want to transition the financial system onto the blockchain, Ethereum is the largest blockchain. It also complies with U.S. law and is a legally recognized blockchain. Ethereum can certainly be used by other countries. The U.S. obviously wants to strengthen its position and dominance on Ethereum.

Please remember, the narrative of Ethereum is not just this one. There is also AI, and if you want to tokenize, whether it’s robots or other things, you want a blockchain that can be protected. So, the tech industry and Wall Street are merging on Ethereum. Do Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan want Ethereum to be held in millions of different wallets? It’s not that they are trying to centralize it, but they want to ensure that staking is done in a compliant manner. Not everyone will choose to do this. This is what we have been saying from the beginning, that BitMine's balance sheet is super clean, with no peculiar capital structure, and everything we do is like that. We have not yet announced BitMine's staking solution, but we are taking time to consider it, as $3 billion of ETH is a significant decision. But it will also fully comply with GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) and how the U.S. wants to conduct staking.

This just shows you that the Ethereum treasury company is key infrastructure. It is not just a fund management game.

In return, you can at least earn staking rewards, but they can also generate income in other ways. Therefore, these Ethereum treasury companies are not just alternatives to Ethereum ETFs. They play a very important role in the Ethereum ecosystem.

Why is the price of ETH still below $4000 when ETH treasury companies have bought so much ETH?

Bankless: Tom, there's something I don't understand. Some ETH bulls, like me, are wondering why, when your Ethereum treasury company buys 3 billion dollars worth of ETH in a month, ETH is still trading below 4000 dollars? Where did your ETH come from? Why hasn't it driven the ETH price up?

Tom Lee: I really don’t want to say too much, because you can imagine that we might be one of the biggest buyers of ETH. What I want to say is that the fair value of Ethereum does not affect the short-term price movement of ETH. Last week, ETH dropped to $3,300 because some people had liquidation levels, or someone was doing arbitrage, or people thought Ethereum was a dead chain betting on another chain and trying to force liquidation. I think this is the recent dynamic.

I believe ETH is experiencing the moment BTC had in 2017 this year, as Wall Street is finally starting to support ETH. BTC was at $1000 at the beginning of 2017 and started to rise sharply in August. We definitely haven't seen Wall Street this interested in ETH and the Ethereum network in four to five years. We are seeing interest from Wall Street manifesting from all corners of the Ethereum ecosystem.

Who is buying Ethereum Treasury Company

Bankless: What attractions do Ethena treasury and ETH treasury have compared to BTC treasury company MicroStrategy and Hype treasury company? Why choose to buy ETH treasury?

Tom Lee: First of all, I really like Bitcoin. I believe Bitcoin is the direction of the future. My research at Fundstrat shows that BTC could reach between one million and one and a half million dollars per coin. So, Bitcoin still has a huge story.

But Bitcoin and Ethereum operate differently in the way the world is financializing. For me, this is a major distinction, as Ethereum represents the financialization of the world on the blockchain, which is not Bitcoin's goal, while the AI world is creating a digitally native way to connect the real world and digital assets.

This is why some people want to own Ethereum treasury companies. The Ethereum treasury company is actually the only way for US stock investors to gain exposure to Ethereum, unless they directly purchase ETH or an ETH ETF. If you are an institution, this is one of the biggest topics. Institutions cannot really buy Ethereum ETFs because it does not fall under the parameters of the fund. Therefore, professional investors in the US stock market see Ethereum treasury companies as the only way to gain macro trading exposure to ETH.

This is why Cathie Woods and Bill Miller made significant investments in BitMine. They are institutional investors. Both of these individuals are crypto OGs and they realize that this is the best way to gain macro exposure to Ethereum.

Where does mNAV premium come from

Bankless: In addition to the mNAV premium, the Ethereum Treasury Company has some additional tools such as the DeFi ecosystem that the Ethereum Treasury Company can actually leverage. What strategies do you have to accumulate more ETH?

Tom Lee: You've asked a very good question, and I have many answers. Most of them I cannot share because any strategy we pursue is proprietary. However, investors should not oversimplify their thinking about treasury companies, as BitMine has become the world's third-largest cryptocurrency treasury company, second only to Mara blockchain and MicroStrategy. So we have more cryptocurrencies than MetaPlanet.

Bankless: Tom, why does mNAV premium exist? I've heard some investors talk about this issue, and their basic point is that the mNAV premium should crash around 1, and it might be below 1 during a bear market. But why does any cryptocurrency treasury company have an mNAV premium in the first place?

Tom Lee: I want to start with the numbers. BitMine has $3 billion in Ethereum. Assuming you are just an ETF with a 1x NAV. But there is a 3% native yield, and the market cap is a 20x PE on the 3% yield, which adds 0.6 to the NAV. Therefore, due to the staking yield of ETH, the mNAV has now reached 1.6.

There are two other components: speed premium and liquidity premium. 1. Speed premium. When BitMine started its Ethereum strategy on July 8, the Ethereum was only $4 per share, and by July 27, it held $23 per share, growing by $19 per share in about 20 days. Today it's even higher, and we haven’t disclosed that yet. BitMine is 12 times that of MicroStrategy. So you must give the NAV growth a speed multiplier. 2. Liquidity premium. MicroStrategy has a daily trading volume of about $3 billion, and BitMine is the second most liquid crypto treasury company, as we trade $1.6 billion daily. This should also warrant a premium. So BitMine's current mNAV is around 1.6.

Bankless: I have a question about speed; speed comes from liquidity. The question is, where does liquidity come from? How do we get more liquidity?

Tom Lee: This may be the synergy of the team.

First, I am the chairman of BitMine. The main investors of BitMine come from private equity, led by MOZAYYX, a very famous and very smart macro hedge fund. We are able to attract holders like the founders of Founders Fund, Stanley Druckenmiller, and Bill Miller. The largest blue-chip stocks in the traditional market and the VC world support BitMine.

Second, I have always been a long-term supporter of cryptocurrency. I strongly advocated for Wall Street to pay attention to Bitcoin as early as 2017. Ethereum is now experiencing its 2017 moment. I think this makes sense for those who understand us.

I wholeheartedly support what Lubin from SharpLink and Andrew Keys from Ether Machine are doing because we are all doing the same thing. We are all working to stake Ethereum to make it a secure American blockchain. We are all working towards the same goal. In the wild west of DeFi, stability and innovation are everything.

Ethereum's 2017 Moment

Bankless: You compared ETH to BTC back in 2017. What was Bitcoin like in 2017? What similarities does it have with Ethereum today?

Tom Lee: I would be happy to tell you the background story of Fundstrat in 2017. Fundstrat is a macro and thematic company. We write articles about the big story arcs (also known as narrative arcs), which led us to focus on Bitcoin, and we conducted two different studies.

One group is the millennials. The oldest millennials in 2017 were in their twenties. We realized that they would be a huge driving force in the U.S. economy. The work we did on millennials was actually quite remarkable, to the point that we eventually collaborated with Snapchat on several white papers discussing how millennials are a group you need to monetize. At that time, Snapchat was trying to convince advertisers to create specific ads for Gen Z and millennials.

The second point is that we noticed Bitcoin. Because when I was at JPMorgan, its price was $100, and then suddenly at the beginning of 2017, it became $1,000. So Fundstrat spent several months trying to understand Bitcoin. I found that it is driven by two very explainable things. First, 97% of the increase from $100 to $1,000 in Bitcoin was driven by the number of wallets and the activity of each wallet. Essentially, it’s the network value effect. We can simply say that in the next few years, if more people use Bitcoin, it will grow exponentially again. So we think it will reach $25,000 by 2022. But if it reaches 5% to 10% of gold's value, it could even rise to $100,000. We really started pushing this narrative that Wall Street needs to understand Bitcoin because it is digital gold. We were really the first Wall Street firm to push it to institutions. In 2017, 0% of institutions owned Bitcoin. Over the past eight years, the biggest narrative for Bitcoin has been digital gold, a store of value.

Our research at the time showed that gold is primarily owned by the Baby Boomer generation. The Millennial generation will own Bitcoin in the same way that the Baby Boomers own gold. This is a generational story, as well as a story of wealth substitution.

This is the background story. I have done a lot of webinars. But in reality, Fundstrat lost institutional clients, and the number of paid clients at Fundstrat actually declined because they thought we were completely crazy. They said, "How can you recommend something that only drug dealers and dark web people use? And you say it's a legitimate asset class." So Fundstrat's reputation has actually been damaged.

Bitcoin is now $120,000, and BTC has risen 120 times. Those who followed us and allocated 1% to 2% of their portfolio to BTC as we recommended have seen their BTC assets become almost 100% of their portfolio value.

This is also happening on Ethereum today, as Ethereum was once a somewhat dormant chain. People want faster networks or more innovative ways to do validation, but Ethereum has not gone down for ten years. This is what matters most to Wall Street. Wall Street has decided that Ethereum is the chain they will build Wall Street on, and it is at a lower price than it was five years ago.

Bankless: Does Wall Street understand that Ethereum is the backbone of many movements happening right now? Is this the reason behind the incredible tailwind for the ETH treasury company? Or is it a story concocted in their minds?

Tom Lee: Wall Street will only understand after it starts making money. Nvidia is a great example. It's a stock with exponential growth. But you know, sometimes Nvidia doesn't move at all for a year; it's just dead money, or Palantir has been dead money for years, and then suddenly there's a step function. The market suddenly realizes, "Oh, wait a minute. Not only do I understand, but we also have to reprice."

This is what is happening on Ethereum right now, as on-chain activity has surged to historical highs. The Ethereum community has been reactivated, and prices have certainly rebounded, with more people using Ethereum. Moreover, the benefits of the genius bill for smart contract blockchains are obvious; it also benefits Bitcoin, but Bitcoin will not support stablecoins.

Is it a bad thing that Ethereum hasn't reached $15,000 today? I've seen things like this before. We recommended Tesla and Nvidia, which have been guaranteed investments in the Fundstrat Capital ETF since 2019, and they have also been in the research portfolio for a long time. They do not track revenue. They have step changes. I think Ethereum is the same. I hope Ethereum can stay at this price for five years because that means we can buy it at a more attractive price.

If ETH is $17,000, then the cost of purchasing ETH for Ethereum treasury companies will be much higher. Of course, their stock prices will benefit. But for me, being able to buy at the current price is actually a good thing.

ETH Price Prediction: 100x Potential

Bankless: Just like Wall Street didn't understand Bitcoin in 2017, it still doesn't understand Ethereum as an asset in 2025. Maybe they are starting to get it. When you first told Wall Street about Bitcoin in 2017, it was around $3000, and now Ethereum is at $3000. You are predicting some very high prices. These prices are astonishing at least in the traditional finance sector. Do you think ETH can do something similar to Bitcoin? How do you predict the price of Ethereum?

Tom Lee: I actually think Ethereum has more upside potential. Because there was more skepticism at the beginning. Bitcoin isn't necessarily something people are shorting. They just don't believe in it. When we wrote in 2017 that BTC would reach $100,000, it seemed crazy. But from 2017 until now, it hasn't been too long and it has risen 100 times.

Ethereum is like Bitcoin in 2017. Wall Street does not professionally believe that Ethereum is even a chain that can survive, because there are some fair criticisms. For example, 1. Ethereum has migrated to proof of stake; 2. There was a time when too much ETH was released, but this issue is being addressed; 3. There is still a question of whether Wall Street will build on Ethereum, whether they will stake ETH or even use ETH; 4. It is believed that Ethereum is an L2 story, and L2 offers no benefits to L1.

These are all concepts that will be broken, and when it happens, the price of ETH will be a step function. So I believe the upward potential of ETH is actually higher than 100 times that of Bitcoin. Bitcoin has increased by 100 times, and Ethereum can also increase by 100 times. Lubin also has this kind of upward potential in mind, because Lubin and I have been communicating, and we are truly partners in promoting the ETH treasury as a digital infrastructure together. I believe this could happen, and Ethereum is very likely to surpass Bitcoin in network value.

If someone believes that the price of Bitcoin can reach one million, then imagine what that means for Ethereum? Because Ethereum is not only the financialization of Wall Street on the blockchain, but also one of the focal points in the U.S. regarding AI dominance. Ethereum plays a strategic role here.

If MicroStrategy's upside potential is three times that of Bitcoin, then theoretically, the upside potential of the Ethereum treasury company could be three times that of Ethereum itself. So, you wouldn't say that the Ethereum treasury company is not a good investment category. If you look at the unique things BitMine is doing, that's also why they should perform well. Because Ethereum itself is undervalued.

Bankless: Some of your predictions may come as a surprise, even in the cryptocurrency space. You mentioned that Ethereum could rise 100 times to around $40 trillion, and you also said that Ethereum might surpass Bitcoin, which is not a mainstream view among the native cryptocurrency community, although many ETH supporters have believed this for a long time. What do you think Ethereum's price will be by the end of this year or at the end of this cycle?

Tom Lee: The price people should consider in the short term is whether ETH can reach $4000. Because the Ethereum story is better than in December 2024, and that is when it will be $4000. We should at least rebound to the $4000 level.

Today's Ethereum story is better than a year ago, when ETH/BTC was 0.05. At a ratio of 0.05, ETH should be $6000. There will be a lot happening from now until the end of the year, including other Ethereum treasury companies starting to buy Ethereum and Bitcoin rising. So I think, before the end of 2025, ETH reaching $7000, or even $12000 or $15000 is not unreasonable.

In 2026, the Federal Reserve begins to shift towards a dovish stance, so the liquidity from the central bank is rising, and ETH should continue to establish itself at these price levels by the end of 2025.

I don't know if there is a crypto cycle, but there should be. This is beneficial for us because I personally think that an Ethereum treasury company wants the ETH price to remain stable over the next five years and then rise sharply. But this may not happen. It could have a step function.

How to Value ETH

Bankless: Tom, how do you analyze the value and price of ETH?

Tom Lee: Cryptocurrency treasury companies are valued based on the asset base of their balance sheets. The valuation of MicroStrategy is actually based on its balance sheet, not its profitability. From 1990 to 2018, a whole generation of a person's career, ExxonMobil was among the top five companies by market capitalization in the S&P 500 throughout this entire period. There were internet waves and so on, but ExxonMobil always remained in the top five. It was never valued based on earnings. It has always been priced based on proven reserves. So cryptocurrency treasury companies are the new ExxonMobil.

When I was working on Wall Street, I learned one lesson: it takes a lot of PE to offset E. People spend too much time on E. But in reality, it's always about PE. The price of ETH is not based on the current trades recorded in any given week. It is actually an understanding of what it will be five years from now.

Bankless: So how do you estimate the size of this market? Do you refer to Ethereum as digital oil, and do you discuss its value ceiling in this way?

Tom Lee: "ETH is digital oil" that report was done very well. I know the Mosaics team also helped to establish two models for Ethereum, one is basically a banking system proxy model, and the other is a payment proxy model.

But ultimately, if I've learned anything in the stock world, it's that one should not be bound by a rigid framework. This is the mistake people make. I do not oppose trying to establish frameworks. But for me, the price of ETH at $3600 seems somewhat absurdly undervalued.

The crypto treasury company is far from the bubble

Bankless: Tom, do you think at some point these cryptocurrency treasury companies might become a bit overheated? Is there a possibility that they could enter bubble territory? Could this lead to excessive inflation, with premiums becoming reflexive, and then suddenly drop like an elevator, causing more systemic effects on cryptocurrencies and the broader economy? Would you be concerned about this?

Tom Lee: A bubble truly forms when everyone is optimistic about it.

The only way for crypto treasury companies to get into trouble is if they use leverage. Anyone dealing with exotic debt structures will run into problems unless they are scarce. MicroStrategy can do a lot because they have changed the world. The same goes for MetaPlanet. Those that are not scarce are the ones that will run into issues. But most crypto treasury companies are quite ordinary. What will happen? Their prices will just fall. But I don't think this will lead to a stock market crash. Stock market crashes are usually a debt issue or an external shock.

We are still far from a bubble. In fact, the market is betting that they are already oversupplied, so they will only rise when Bitcoin goes up.