Key Takeaway
Market pundits now expect ETH to flip BTC amid several bullish catalysts. Options data showed traders were betting ETH could surge above $4K by July and tag $5K by December.
There is a growing consensus amongst Wall Street players that Ethereum [ETH] could flip Bitcoin [BTC] and get to the top crypto spot.
In a recent interview with CNBC, Paul Brody, Ernst & Young’s (EY) global blockchain lead, echoed a similar stance and said,
“Ether will be a larger asset than Bitcoin.”
ETH’s outlook: Short-term vs. long run
He added that they expected a ‘stampede’ as more enterprises and banks adopt ETH and incorporate it into treasuries after the GENIUS Act was signed into law.
Citing the tokenization trend that has already begun with Robinhood announcing its L2 on ETH, Brody noted that all these will drive network activity and drive ETH past BTC.
“Because ETH is the power of all these transactions (tokenization) in the Ethereum ecosystem, it will drive tremendous demand for ETH to a much larger asset than Bitcoin.”
His statement on ETH treasury demand is already playing out, with over $6 billion in ETH held by firms.
SharpLink Gaming, led by Consensys and Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin and BitMine, spearheaded by Tom Lee, has crossed the $1 billion mark in ETH treasury in less than three months.
Source: Strategic ETH Reserve
In particular, BitMine has 300.7K ETH and plans to buy 5% of the overall ETH supply, or 6 million ETH, to ramp up staking rewards and capture the expected stablecoin and tokenization booms.
ETH/BTC ratio suggests…
Since the Bitcoin DeFi is still nascent and Ethereum has a strong lead in this front, this could also set ETH for outperformance in the long run.
That said, ETH has seen renewed bullish market sentiment from Q2, triggering capital rotation from BTC to ETH, per the ETH/BTC ratio.
Source: X
The ratio tracks ETH’s relative price performance to BTC. It dropped to a 5-year low of 0.017, but has recovered 72% to 0.030.
In other words, between May and July, ETH investors made over 70% more than BTC holders.
Whether the recovery will continue in the long term as Wall Street expects remains to be seen. However, the short-term market interest was heavier on ETH than BTC.
In fact, on the speculative side, Coinbase analysts noted that ETH’s perpetual volume was nearly double BTC in the past 24 hours, primarily driven by basis trade.
“Perpetual-swap data showed Ethereum trading ~$106B yesterday (~37% of the global market and nearly twice BTC), while open interest across perps, term futures, and options for ETH hit a record high.”
Source: Laevitas
ETh traded at $3.56K as of press time. So, what’s next for ETH in the short term?
Sean Dawson, head of research at crypto derivative platform Derive, stated that Option traders expect a sharp move above $4K by July 25.
Dawson added that the odds of ETH surging above $4K by the end of July were up 14%. For $5K price target by the end of 2025, the chance was up 27%.
“With macro tailwinds, falling rates, and ETF momentum aligning, the back half of 2025 is setting up to be Ethereum’s strongest in years.”
Still, some traders were not taking any chances and hedged for any potential retracement in the short term, added Coinbase.
“ETH 25D put-call skew (30-day) is slightly positive (+0.95%), suggesting some investors are still seeking downside protection on ETH for the very short term.”
