BitMine chair Tom Lee and BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes remain firm in their prediction that Ether will reach $10,000 this year, despite a recent downturn in the crypto market, with less than three months remaining.
“For Ethereum, I expect it to be somewhere between [$10,000] and $12,000,” Lee stated on the Bankless podcast on Tuesday when discussing his outlook for the cryptocurrency’s price by the year’s end.
Hayes, who joined the same podcast, expressed his intent to maintain his $10,000 prediction for year-end.
Currently, with Ether (ETH) trading at $4,129, a climb to $10,000 would signify an approximate gain of 142%, a target that Hayes and Lee believe is achievable, even as a conservative estimate for the remainder of the year.
Lee asserts Ethereum has been “basing” since 2021
Lee pointed out that such a significant rally would not indicate excessive market speculation, as Ether has been largely consolidating within a range since it reached its all-time high of $4,878 in 2021. “Ethereum has been basing for four years now, just breaking out of the range. To me, it wouldn’t indicate a blow-off top, but rather the start of price discovery at a new level,” Lee remarked.
Ether only momentarily reclaimed the 2021 highs in August this year, subsequently retracing and failing to return to that level.
Lee mentioned, “Next year will bring a lot of fundamental developments,” adding, “I don’t think we’re at the peak, but it could be a significant level, perhaps a favorable one.”
Hayes and Lee have been predicting a notable surge in Ether’s price since the start of this year.
Historical data indicates a different outcome: $5,000 may be realistic
Their forecasts come after Friday’s market crash, which led to over $19 billion in liquidations across the crypto sector and a widespread drop in cryptocurrency values.
Ether, which was trading around $4,350 before the crash, has fallen to $4,129 at the time of this report.
Related: ETH down 6.7% after crypto ‘Black Friday,’ showing more resilience than alts
However, historical trends suggest Ether’s year-end target might be closer to half of Hayes and Lee’s projections.
October 1 marked the beginning of Q4, a period that has historically shown an average return of 21.36% for Ether since 2016, according to CoinGlass.
If a similar gain occurs from its current price, the asset would approach the $5,000 mark by the year’s end. This aligns closer to the more cautious predictions from other experts, such as Tesseract CEO James Harris, who anticipates a price of around $6,500.
Other analysts are considering the potential for Ether to reach new all-time highs soon. MN Capital founder Michael van de Poppe noted that Sunday’s drop caused the ETH/BTC pair to decline to 0.032, an “ideal zone for purchases.”
Van de Poppe stated in a Tuesday X post, “It needs to establish a higher low, and then we’re headed towards new highs.”
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