Bitcoins - about to hit $5,000 per coin today!

[Griffith]

Forecasts for tokenized assets:

McKinsey: $2–4T by 2030.
ArkInvest: $11T by 2030.
Ripple: $9.4T by 2030, $18.9T by 2033.
StandardChartered: $30T + by 2034.

Franklin Templeton's Chris Perkins has said the tokenized equity markets will go "from zero to $127 trillion" once liquidity arrives.

Three years ago, the tokenized RWA market was worth roughly $2.3B

Today, it stands at $44.5B, an increase of 1,819.5%

[Necrosis]

Forecasts for tokenized assets:

McKinsey: $2–4T by 2030.
ArkInvest: $11T by 2030.
Ripple: $9.4T by 2030, $18.9T by 2033.
StandardChartered: $30T + by 2034.

Franklin Templeton's Chris Perkins has said the tokenized equity markets will go "from zero to $127 trillion" once liquidity arrives.

Three years ago, the tokenized RWA market was worth roughly $2.3B

Today, it stands at $44.5B, an increase of 1,819.5%

ETH has been dog shit these last few years, barely any real gains. When will this shit actually matter if ever.

[gib]

ETH has been dog shit these last few years, barely any real gains. When will this shit actually matter if ever.

Eth does matter, and it does have real use. My basic valuation puts it at around $500 per coin. So, anything below that price I would consider accumulating. But yes, from the highs it once hit, and for all those people who hoped to trade ETH so as to eventually get more BTC, - yes, it has performed terribly.

[obsidian]

Eth does matter, and it does have real use. My basic valuation puts it at around $500 per coin. So, anything below that price I would consider accumulating. But yes, from the highs it once hit, and for all those people who hoped to trade ETH so as to eventually get more BTC, - yes, it has performed terribly.

The dollar value of ETH is established by what people are willing to pay or sell it for, not by some static formula that arbitrarily pegs it at $500. Because ETH is a commodity, P/E ratios are less relevant. I, for one, think a reasonable valuation would be a point where there is no premium for BTC over ETH. Due to supply differences, that means ETH should be valued at roughly 1/6 of BTC. Based on Bitcoin's current price, that would translate to an ETH value of $13,133. I am not the only one who thinks ETH is undervalued, making the $500 figure entirely meaningless.

So far, ETH has underperformed. Ironically, however, a person could have made more money trading ETH than holding BTC over the last five years. During this period, ETH fluctuated between $4,000 and $2,000 (or lower) five or six times. If you had simply sold ETH at $4,000 and bought back in at $2,000, you could have easily quadrupled your holdings or better. Meanwhile, BTC is up about 52% from five years ago. A savvy ETH trader would have outperformed that baseline by a wide margin due to ETH's volatility. I am not particularly happy about this dynamic, nor do I view it as a total win, because I believe in ETH's potential as a store of value (SOV) and have primarily just held and staked it. However, from a purely trading point of view, more people have made money timing ETH at the right valuations than by simply holding BTC.

Ultimately, the value of ETH will be defined by what the market is willing to pay. This is where network effects and mindshare come into play. While Bitcoin is currently ahead in that regard, it faces other looming issues, such as the long-term sustainability of the Proof of Work (PoW) model and potential threats from quantum computing.

[obsidian]

Forecasts for tokenized assets:

McKinsey: $2–4T by 2030.
ArkInvest: $11T by 2030.
Ripple: $9.4T by 2030, $18.9T by 2033.
StandardChartered: $30T + by 2034.

Franklin Templeton's Chris Perkins has said the tokenized equity markets will go "from zero to $127 trillion" once liquidity arrives.

Three years ago, the tokenized RWA market was worth roughly $2.3B

Today, it stands at $44.5B, an increase of 1,819.5%

How does any of that actually make ETH's price go up?

ETH's price will moon when construction workers on a job site start asking each other, "Hey, did you buy some ETH yet?" That is literally what guys on the ground did with XRP in the past.

Retail FOMO and people craving the asset the same way they want a Lambo are what drive prices higher — not the dry financial stats you just posted. The average guy on the street couldn't care less about metrics. They buy because they know they want Bitcoin, or because they want XRP. It all comes down to a primitive, psychological narrative.

[Griffith]

How does any of that actually make ETH's price go up?

ETH's price will moon when construction workers on a job site start asking each other, "Hey, did you buy some ETH yet?" That is literally what guys on the ground did with XRP in the past.

Retail FOMO and people craving the asset the same way they want a Lambo are what drive prices higher — not the dry financial stats you just posted. The average guy on the street couldn't care less about metrics. They buy because they know they want Bitcoin, or because they want XRP. It all comes down to a primitive, psychological narrative.

You're right about how retail mania pumped XRP and memecoins, that was pure hype and FOMO. But thinking ETH needs construction workers buying it to moon is looking at this through a retail view.

This isn't hype anymore, it’s mainstream adoption.

Look at what the actual smart money is doing right now. Blackrock doesn't care about retail hype, they built their multi-billion dollar BUIDL and BSTBL funds right on top of Ethereum.

And look at Tom Lee. Bitmine has been aggressively buying ETH and they currently own 5.8 million ETH, nearly 5% of the entire circulating supply.

Plus, with AI taking over, automated programs can't use old-school legacy bank accounts that take 3 days to clear. They need smart contracts to transact instantly. Ethereum is becoming the mandatory plumbing for both Wall Street tokenization and the machine economy.

Every single time these massive institutions or AI networks move a tokenized stock, clear an on-chain trade, or pay out a dividend, they are forced by protocol to pay gas fees in ETH.

And because of the network's burn mechanism, a massive chunk of that ETH is permanently destroyed out of existence.

If Wall Street migrates even a tiny 1% fraction of their assets onto Ethereum, millions of ETH are going to get sucked out of circulation automatically.

Wall Street would have to burn ETH to move their money. That massive institutional consumption creates supply scarcity, and that's what drives the price up, not retail hype.

[Griffith]

The dollar value of ETH is established by what people are willing to pay or sell it for, not by some static formula that arbitrarily pegs it at $500. Because ETH is a commodity, P/E ratios are less relevant. I, for one, think a reasonable valuation would be a point where there is no premium for BTC over ETH. Due to supply differences, that means ETH should be valued at roughly 1/6 of BTC. Based on Bitcoin's current price, that would translate to an ETH value of $13,133. I am not the only one who thinks ETH is undervalued, making the $500 figure entirely meaningless.

So far, ETH has underperformed. Ironically, however, a person could have made more money trading ETH than holding BTC over the last five years. During this period, ETH fluctuated between $4,000 and $2,000 (or lower) five or six times. If you had simply sold ETH at $4,000 and bought back in at $2,000, you could have easily quadrupled your holdings or better. Meanwhile, BTC is up about 52% from five years ago. A savvy ETH trader would have outperformed that baseline by a wide margin due to ETH's volatility. I am not particularly happy about this dynamic, nor do I view it as a total win, because I believe in ETH's potential as a store of value (SOV) and have primarily just held and staked it. However, from a purely trading point of view, more people have made money timing ETH at the right valuations than by simply holding BTC.

Ultimately, the value of ETH will be defined by what the market is willing to pay. This is where network effects and mindshare come into play. While Bitcoin is currently ahead in that regard, it faces other looming issues, such as the long-term sustainability of the Proof of Work (PoW) model and potential threats from quantum computing.

Agreed.

I took profits at pre-defined levels throughout last year and sold a chunk of my ETH.

For me, the risk/reward ratio is much better with spot trading or limit buys and limit sells.

Mistiming the previous dip and buying at 2000 or 2100 instead of 1600 is still much better than holding all the way from near 5K and missing all those potential moves.

Same with BTC, better than holding all the way from 120k when fresh buys could be made, even at 80k would be better than simply holding everything.

[YLLSHTH]

Is it more likely for bitcoin to go to zero or to $500,000?

[GymnJuice]

Is it more likely for bitcoin to go to zero or to $500,000?

I think it is highly unlikely to go to zero at this point. I think it will continue to cycle with massive ups and downs. So, I think that makes an eventual $500000 more likely. But that could be a ways off.

The only way I could see it going to zero is if multiple governments outlawed it. Like the US did with gold years ago.

But who knows. That could counterintuitively cause more people to actually want it. 

[obsidian]

You're right about how retail mania pumped XRP and memecoins, that was pure hype and FOMO. But thinking ETH needs construction workers buying it to moon is looking at this through a retail view.

This isn't hype anymore, it’s mainstream adoption.

Look at what the actual smart money is doing right now. Blackrock doesn't care about retail hype, they built their multi-billion dollar BUIDL and BSTBL funds right on top of Ethereum.

And look at Tom Lee. Bitmine has been aggressively buying ETH and they currently own 5.8 million ETH, nearly 5% of the entire circulating supply.

Plus, with AI taking over, automated programs can't use old-school legacy bank accounts that take 3 days to clear. They need smart contracts to transact instantly. Ethereum is becoming the mandatory plumbing for both Wall Street tokenization and the machine economy.

Every single time these massive institutions or AI networks move a tokenized stock, clear an on-chain trade, or pay out a dividend, they are forced by protocol to pay gas fees in ETH.

And because of the network's burn mechanism, a massive chunk of that ETH is permanently destroyed out of existence.

If Wall Street migrates even a tiny 1% fraction of their assets onto Ethereum, millions of ETH are going to get sucked out of circulation automatically.

Wall Street would have to burn ETH to move their money. That massive institutional consumption creates supply scarcity, and that's what drives the price up, not retail hype.

They amount of ETH they burn is miniscule. Here's the stats for the past day:

https://ultrasound.money/?timeFrame=d1

Time Frame: 1 Day
31.48 ETH burned
2,929.58 ETH issued

Zooming out, 1.07 million ETH will currently be issued per year, and only 11,000 ETH burned. That represents a supply growth or inflation of 0.87%. As more ETH gets staked, the inflation could go beyond 1% and cap at 1.5%. That is why there's intense discussions currently underway to reduce the yield to stakers. At some point more staked ETH hurts more than it helps.

The transaction volume needs to scale significantly so more ETH can be burned. The problem will all these newer chains like Solana that introduced cheap fees is it became a race to the bottom and Ethereum does need more fee revenue to help with the burn. Bitcoin has the same problem. The fee revenue is insufficient to offset the declining block rewards.

We'll see how it all shakes out.

Don’t underestimate retail FOMO. ETH got close to $5K in 2021 without BlackRock, SEC approval, ETFs, etc. Now, after all these supposedly “positive developments,” it’s still worth roughly 50% of its 2021 ATH.

Meanwhile, BTC and XRP are well above their 2021 ATHs, and BNB is back around its 2021 ATH. ETH’s performance has been absolutely horrendous.

And honestly, I don’t want a slow climb driven by ETFs and institutional accumulation. Maybe that’s exactly what “they” want — lots of time to accumulate — but I’m done playing that game. I accumulated, I held, and yeah, I fucked up by not dumping it all near the top and potentially buying back at the bottom.

ETH’s performance simply hasn’t cut it. It has been volatile as fuck and, over that period, didn’t even outperform BTC. I’m stubborn, and I’m not interested in BTC because I think its PoW model is fundamentally fucked. But I’m definitely going to offload 50% of my ETH once it gets back above the 2025 ATH.

Yes, I’m staking it, but the yield is almost irrelevant when the underlying asset has underperformed this badly.

At this point, ETH needs to 2x just to catch up with BNB. That says a lot.

[obsidian]

Agreed.

I took profits at pre-defined levels throughout last year and sold a chunk of my ETH.

For me, the risk/reward ratio is much better with spot trading or limit buys and limit sells.

Mistiming the previous dip and buying at 2000 or 2100 instead of 1600 is still much better than holding all the way from near 5K and missing all those potential moves.

Same with BTC, better than holding all the way from 120k when fresh buys could be made, even at 80k would be better than simply holding everything.

That’s hindsight vision. Last year, when ETH almost hit $5K, I figured it was still going to $10K before topping out, so I held back from selling anything. Then 10/10 happened, and we were back to round-tripping this bitch.

I did sell BNB close to the top, and I also sold some ZEC recently. But I held onto ETH, not realizing it was going to suffer a third-cycle curse like XRP.

Ethereum’s marketing has also been terrible. The EF doesn’t seem interested in marketing ETH as an asset, so they’ve now started new foundations to help close that gap. I just wish I had paid closer attention to all of this and been more skeptical of ETH. If I had, I probably would have dumped it at $4.5K one of the many times it got there over the past five years.

The moral of the story: be skeptical of what you hold. Date it, don’t marry it, and try to sell when you think it’s near the top.

Of course, knowing my luck, I’ll sell ETH at $7K and that’ll be the exact moment it starts ripping to $20K. So I’m not going to sell all of it. I’ll probably sell in 10% batches and leave 40–50% on the table.

And the reality is, the dollar itself is a complete shitcoin. How do we know it won’t eventually collapse and make $10K ETH look meaningless?