Public Firms Now Control Ethereum Network, Says Tom Lee

Tom Lee, head of research at Fundstrat and chairman of Bitmine Immersion Technologies, claims that public firms have taken over stewardship of the Ethereum network. He made this statement during his keynote at the Proof of Talk conference in Paris. According to Lee, the nonprofit Ethereum Foundation has significantly reduced its holdings, down to 100,000 ETH (0.1% of supply).

Public companies, particularly Bitmine and Sharplink, have filled this gap by becoming validators on the network. Together, they hold 7% of circulating ETH and earn around $500 million in staking rewards annually.

Bitmine's recent purchase of 111,942 ETH (worth approximately $237 million) has lifted its holdings to nearly 5.4 million ETH (about 4.47% of supply). Lee tied this development to an upcoming wave of machine activity, where robots will require instant payments, and he believes blockchain technology is better suited for authentication, identity, and payment speed.

Lee also discussed his price call, stating that Ethereum could eventually reach $250,000 driven by tokenization and AI. However, he did not provide a specific timeline.