Fundstrat co-founder Tom Lee is convinced Ethereum ($ETH) has become the key decentralized component of the “second wave” of AI, as investors redirect capital away from the overheated semiconductor sector.
While chipmakers are entering a correction, Ethereum has outperformed the computer memory sector (DRAM) by 55% over the past month, triggering inflows into spot crypto ETFs such as BlackRock’s ETHA, Lee said in a fresh X post.
Of course, the analyst is far from a neutral observer, as Lee outlined his AI strategy in an official letter to shareholders of BitMine Immersion Technologies, where he serves as chairman of the board.
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Ethereum is a key AI downstream story:– AI will need guardrails
– Consumers unlikely to trust govts, big tech, or banks to protect consumershttps://t.co/N39ACKzHjV— Thomas (Tom) Lee (not drummer) FundstratDirect.com (@fundstrat) July 17, 2026
BitMine has accumulated 5.77 million $ETH on its balance sheet — 4.8% of the cryptocurrency’s total global supply — becoming the largest corporate holder of Ethereum in the world and making Tom Lee a major beneficiary of his own forecast.
Why Tom Lee is betting on Ethereum over AI chips
In his letter, the entrepreneur highlighted two pragmatic reasons why AI and blockchain will inevitably merge into a single ecosystem:
- Machines need rules: Emerging autonomous AI agents, which are beginning to execute transactions and transfer funds without human involvement, require a secure and immutable settlement environment. Ethereum serves as an independent digital framework, or set of guardrails.
- A crisis of trust: Users are unlikely to entrust the security of their data and wallets in the AI era to governments, banks, or Big Tech corporations. A decentralized network remains the only neutral alternative for protecting consumer rights. Venture capital firm a16z has already described this technological symbiosis as the “great convergence.”
At the same time, Ethereum’s position is being strengthened by traditional finance, according to Lee. The explosive success of Robinhood Chain, where all transaction fees are settled in $ETH, is effectively turning the asset into global digital money.
The Fundstrat co-founder also pointed to BlackRock’s Ethereum-based BUIDL fund, which has already surpassed $2.6 billion, and to JPMorgan moving its products onto Ethereum’s public rails while developing its own tokenized MONY fund there.
Lee considers the current pessimism among retail investors a mistake, describing the mass sell-offs as “rage quitting at the bottom.” According to the analyst, Ethereum’s current position is comparable to Amazon’s early years, when temporary stagnation on the chart concealed the potential for future multi-fold growth.
