Tom Lee – From Wall Street Strategist to Ethereum's Biggest Bull

1 Author: Climber, CryptoPulseLabs

Over the past few years, if you were to pick the person on Wall Street who best understands how to present Ethereum as a macro asset, Tom Lee would definitely be near the top of the list.

To many traditional financial investors, he is the strategist who repeatedly emphasizes in the media that "US stocks will rise, Bitcoin will rise, and Ethereum will rise"; but to participants in the crypto market, he is more like an alternative narrative accelerator. Whenever the market is in a phase of hesitation, wait-and-see, or low sentiment, he often uses stronger language and more aggressive target prices to push Bitcoin and Ethereum back into the mainstream financial spotlight.

But Tom Lee's influence didn't appear out of thin air. He didn't start in the cryptocurrency world, nor did he begin with social media hype; instead, he's a typical Wall Street researcher. Having worked extensively in investment banking and research institutions, he's skilled in macroeconomic cycles, capital flows, and valuation models, making him a regular feature in mainstream American financial media before entering the crypto space. It's this combination of traditional financial background and a belief in crypto assets that makes him one of the few individuals who can be listened to by both sides.

I. Wall Street Background: The Standard Path from Researcher to Strategist

Tom Lee's career path is not mysterious; he followed a very standard Wall Street route: research, strategy, macro analysis, and client communication.

Unlike many strategists who become more cautious later in their careers, Tom Lee's style is exactly the opposite—the later he gets, the more he dares to express clear directions, and even dares to turn predictions into a communicable product.

Early in his career, Tom Lee worked for several financial institutions in the United States, with his most important experience being as chief equity strategist at JP Morgan.

During that period, he developed two key skills: First, how to transform complex macroeconomic variables, such as interest rates, inflation, the US dollar, credit spreads, and corporate profits, into actionable investment ideas. Second, how to clearly explain a trend to institutional clients and persuade them to invest.

This kind of experience is crucial because the crypto market is inherently a highly narrative-driven market. Market movements are often driven not by financial statements, but by macroeconomic expectations, funding structures, and risk appetite. Tom Lee's strength lies precisely in translating macroeconomic language into market language.

Therefore, the underlying logic behind Tom Lee 's fame is that he is not a KOL in the cryptocurrency circle, but a person who tells a story on a macro level .

Tom Lee truly gained widespread recognition in the market after leaving the traditional investment banking system. Around 2014, he and his partners co-founded Fundstrat Global Advisors, commonly known as Fundstrat.

This is an independent research institution whose business model falls somewhere between macro research, investment strategy, and market consulting. Its clients include both institutional funds and a wider range of market investors.

The establishment of Fundstrat itself reflects a shift in the times: research on Wall Street is moving from the traditional investment banking system to independent research institutions, and strategists are no longer just serving investment banking clients, but are directly delivering their views to the market.

It was during this period that Tom Lee gradually developed his personal brand. This was characterized by clear viewpoints, a broad and comprehensive logic, and an expression that was easily disseminated.

In Fundstrat's early research, his primary focus remained on US stocks. Tom Lee maintained a very firm long-term bullish stance on the US stock market, repeatedly emphasizing that the market rewards long-term holders and providing clear judgments at many key junctures.

Although his predictions are not always accurate, he has an advantage in that he is good at breaking down the market into an understandable framework, rather than simply making price predictions.

II . The Shift to Crypto: One of the Driving Forces Behind the "Wall Street-ification" of the Bitcoin and Ethereum Narrative

Tom Lee's role in the crypto market can be summarized in one sentence: he was one of the people who brought Bitcoin into the Wall Street narrative.

Many people mistakenly believe that those in traditional finance are entering the crypto market because they see the potential for quick profits. However, Tom Lee's logic leans more towards macro asset allocation.

He views Bitcoin as a new type of risky asset and a tool for hedging against uncertainties in the monetary system. Especially during periods of global monetary easing and abundant dollar liquidity, he often analyzes Bitcoin within the same framework as gold and US tech stocks.

One of his most frequently cited arguments is that Bitcoin's price will be influenced by global liquidity and the level of institutional investment in the long run, rather than simply by retail investor sentiment. In other words, he's not talking about how to play the crypto game, but rather the logic of asset pricing.

For example, during the 2017 Bitcoin bull market, Tom Lee's public opinions began to appear frequently in mainstream financial media. He held a very aggressive bullish stance on Bitcoin and gave many high target price predictions.

This style is certainly not uncommon in the cryptocurrency world, but it is very rare among Wall Street strategists. This is precisely why he quickly became a media darling, a figure who possesses both the authority of traditional finance and the exaggerated narratives of the cryptocurrency world.

However, those who are always bullish will always be questioned , whether during periods of cryptocurrency market downturn or the sustained plunge of Ethereum.

The greater Tom Lee's fame, the more controversy he attracts. Especially during the crypto bear markets of 2018 and 2022, his long-term bullish stance was repeatedly ridiculed by the market. On social media, he is often labeled "always bullish" and "the king of top predictions."

However, this controversy is quite normal if we place his role within a larger narrative. Tom Lee is not a short-term trader; he is more like a macro-narrative analyst. His job is not to accurately predict prices on a particular day, but to provide a long-term framework for the market.

He frequently emphasizes core logics such as Bitcoin's scarcity and long-term supply and demand structure, the impact of global monetary policy cycles on risk assets, valuation repricing brought about by institutional capital inflows, and the logic of alternative assets when the dollar weakens and inflation expectations rise...

These logics are not new, but Tom Lee's strength lies in his ability to present them in a way that sounds very much like Wall Street and is well-suited for television broadcasting.

In other words, his predictions may be wrong, but his narrative will be remembered.

III. ETH—The Underlying Asset of On-Chain Finance in Tom Lee's Eyes

Many people are optimistic about Ethereum (ETH) because of its technology, ecosystem, developers, L2, and so on. However, Tom Lee's logic for being optimistic about ETH is more financial; he understands Ethereum using a valuation method similar to that of traditional assets.

In traditional finance, the US dollar is the settlement currency; in the US stock market, cash is the core; and in the internet, traffic is the underlying resource.

From Tom Lee's perspective, Ethereum plays a role similar to an "on-chain settlement layer".

You'll find that many applications, such as stablecoin on-chain transactions, RWA, and on-chain lending, essentially require a trusted settlement layer. While many chains are vying for this position, Ethereum has long maintained its combined advantage of "strongest security, strongest ecosystem, and strongest institutional recognition."

For Tom Lee, ETH is not just a project coin, but a core asset of an underlying financial infrastructure. As long as on-chain finance continues to develop, ETH's value capture will have a long-term foundation.

At the same time, ETH is more like a productive asset than a purely speculative asset, which is one of the key reasons why Tom Lee is optimistic about ETH.

Bitcoin's value logic is closer to that of digital gold: scarcity, inflation protection, and store of value.

ETH's value logic is more like that of a productive asset. For example, the network generates transaction fees, which reduce supply through a burning mechanism; the staking mechanism gives ETH a "yield"-like attribute; and a thriving ecosystem increases on-chain activity, thereby increasing demand for ETH...

This structure makes ETH seem more like an asset with endogenous cash flow in his eyes, similar to a new form of internet infrastructure stock.

When the market enters an institutional phase, institutions tend to prefer assets that can explain the value capture path, rather than assets that can only rise based on consensus.

In addition, ETH has a clearer supply and demand reinforcement mechanism, namely deflation and staking.

After Ethereum switched to PoS, two very important mechanisms emerged: staking reduces circulating supply (locking) and burning reduces total supply (deflation). This means that as long as Ethereum network activity remains at a certain level, the supply and demand relationship for ETH may remain tight in the long term.

This is rare in traditional assets because stocks can be bought back, but buybacks require company profits. Gold supply is stable but cannot be reduced. ETH supply, however, changes dynamically with network activity. This mechanism, in his view, gives ETH a self-reinforcing economic model.

Finally, and most importantly, ETH is a core asset under the compliance narrative, which makes it easier for institutions to accept ETH.

Tom Lee emphasized early on that the crypto market would eventually become institutionalized and compliant. With the emergence of ETFs, crypto assets began to enter the asset allocation system of traditional finance.

For institutions, Bitcoin is the easiest to understand because its narrative is simple. However, once ETH is brought under regulatory oversight, its appeal will increase rapidly because it is not merely a store of value, but the underlying asset of the on-chain economy.

Institutional investors typically prioritize explainable sources of value, sustainable demand, greater market depth, and clearer regulatory boundaries. ETH is gradually meeting these criteria, a point repeatedly emphasized by Tom Lee. As the crypto market enters its next phase, ETH's valuation will increasingly resemble that of traditional assets, rather than being purely speculative.

Conclusion

Therefore, Tom Lee's core strategy isn't simply being bullish, but rather understanding cycles. He's not a KOL in the crypto world who shouts out trading signals, but a strategist who studies crypto assets within a macro framework. His long-term bullish outlook stems from his understanding of risk asset cycles. And his preference for ETH comes from his assessment of the underlying on-chain financial assets.

In his view, Bitcoin is more like digital gold, a barometer of macro liquidity and risk appetite. Ethereum, on the other hand, is more like the core asset of the on-chain financial system, a direct beneficiary of future on-chain economic expansion.

Therefore, in a noisy market, Tom Lee offers a way of thinking that is closer to institutional and long-term perspectives. And this way of thinking is precisely the ability that many ordinary investors lack most.