Bitmine Immuable Inc. (NASDAQ: BTMN) Chairman Tom Lee is making one of his boldest calls yet, predicting that Ethereum will surpass its prior all-time high of around $5,000 before the year is out.

Lee, who also serves as head of research at Fundstrat and is a contributor at CNBC, made the prediction in a new interview with Coinage, citing the accelerating Wall Street trend of tokenizing real-world assets on the Ethereum network.

His confidence in Ethereum has grown steadily over recent months as ETH has outperformed both equities and the broader artificial intelligence trade during the summer.

“The crypto bull market… we believe it’s been already confirmed,” Lee said, pointing to ETH’s roughly 7,000-basis point lead over the S&P 500 since June.

Lee added that the strength of crypto-related stocks further supports his bullish thesis, noting that they are “by a country mile, the best performing assets so far in the third quarter.”

A key pillar of Lee’s argument centers on a catch-up trade he expects to materialize later this year, driven by investors who remain significantly under-allocated to the asset class.

He highlighted the decisions by both Robinhood and Coinbase to offer tokenized stocks on their respective Ethereum Layer-2 blockchains as a particularly bullish signal for future network activity and demand.

“The thing that most stands out to me is Robinhood decided to build on Ethereum, not because they were getting the best price or they were going to try to like fight against fees,” Lee said, “But it’s because it’s the most secure chain and the most liquid.”

Despite Ethereum rallying 64% off its 2026 low in June, Lee noted that the move has been met with surprisingly little enthusiasm from the broader investment community.

“Ethereum from $1,500 to $2,800, I think it’s been met with almost complete silence,” he said, adding that large players with bearish positions have suffered substantial losses as a result of the rally.

Lee is not merely talking up Ethereum from the sidelines, having directed Bitmine, the largest Ethereum digital asset treasury company, to purchase ETH each and every week since the firm established its treasury strategy in June of last year.

Bitmine is now closing in on its stated goal of acquiring 5% of all outstanding ETH, and when pressed by Coinage on whether a new target would be announced, Lee remained deliberately coy.

Lee was clear that this particular crypto cycle is structurally different from previous booms, including the 2017 ICO frenzy and the post-pandemic NFT-driven rally that followed.

“I think that there is a much larger cohort of new investors that are going to come to crypto, and I think that’s what differentiates it,” Lee said, pointing to tokenization, a pro-crypto regulatory environment, government support, and growing AI-linked applications as catalysts.

“But with tokenization coming in a very large way, and a pro-crypto regulatory backdrop, and then of course, government support at a time when AI… and a lot of applications [are] being built around crypto, I think it’s a much larger universe of people that are going to get involved,” he said.