Tom Lee said Ether may lead the crypto market in the third quarter, with asset tokenization and Agentic AI identified as possible drivers of the next market cycle.
Lee said the ETH/BTC ratio has typically risen during historical crypto bull cycles as Ethereum’s use increased relative to Bitcoin. Non-fungible tokens in 2020-2021 and stablecoins in 2025 had served as important catalysts for the growth of Ethereum applications.
Tokenization and Agentic AI
For the next cycle, Lee said Wall Street could tokenize assets and deploy them on blockchains. Agentic AI could also increase its use of blockchain networks. In his view, both developments could push the ETH/BTC ratio higher.
Potential catalysts for late 2026
Lee pointed to several positive catalysts for the final months of 2026. They include an expected vote on the CLARITY Act in mid-September, South Korean investors returning to crypto and shifting from AI stocks to the crypto market, and a four-year cycle that he believes will bottom within the next few weeks.
Lee said these factors could pave the way for large-scale institutional inflows during the final months of 2026. He also said ETH had been the best-performing macro asset since the third quarter of 2026 began. As of last Friday, ETH had outperformed the S&P 500 by 5,430 basis points. Since June 30, the three best-performing assets were ETH, BTC and SOL.
Lee said crypto assets’ significant outperformance against other macro assets so far in the third quarter could attract institutions to increase their crypto allocations. The comments were published by PRNewswire and carried by Odaily.