u/r2002

Check out this exchange between Ryan of Bankless and Tom Lee.

Ryan: >I strongly agree with this. And right now I think the best positioned candidate is @fundstrat and @BitMNR

Tom Lee: >Agree with @RyanSAdams that a deep bench of leaders and developers are ready to ensure $ETH remains the future settlement layer of finance and AI

>to me, much of bearish sentiment reflects the disdain and despair seen at the nadir of crypto winter (finger pointing at the lows)

>Blockchain is arguably the only way agentic AI interacts in commerce. And blockchain vastly improves the profit profile of the financial system

So Tom Lee didn't quite step up and claim the throne. But he didn't quite refuse it either.

For context, there's some controversy right now relating to lots of exits from the EF of key personnel. At first I was worried, but if Tom Lee is stepping in...

For me, a key bull thesis is this:

• Ethereum's value is not the transactions fees (which is being siphoned by L2s), but rather the trust layer and security it provides institutions. ✅

• Institutions will adopt Ethereum because it is the most decentralized and have the best uptime. ✅

• Institutional adoption of Ethereum will raise the value of Ethereum. Because To validate or secure their own activity, institutions are likely to stake ETH, removing supply from circulation. Less liquid supply against rising demand pressures price upward. ???

The last part I don't quite understand. Couldn't institutions act as free riders and depend on OTHER people to provide the decentralization and security? Or maybe I'm not understanding it correctly.

When I ask LLMs why Tom Lee and Etherealize are so vague on the last point, they say it's because they're trying to thread the needle for regulatory reasons.

Internet protocols like TCP/IP are critical to infrastructure, but no one is making money from it. Why is Ethereum different?

I was a bit sad when the article turned out to be about SBET and not BMNR. It's paywalled so I pasted the article below. But before you rad it, it's worth understanding that BMNR is pursuing another less riskier strategy:

Dimension	Sharplink	Bitmine (BMNR)
Primary Yield Source	Active management and DeFi liquidity pools	Native Ethereum staking via proprietary infrastructure
Execution Method	Partnering with third-party asset managers	Building the in-house MAVAN validator network
Risk Profile	Higher risk exposure to DeFi and smart contracts	Lower risk focused on institutional-grade staking
Core Objective	Maximizing shareholder returns via compound strategies	Controlling 5% of ETH supply to influence staking

CNBC PRO:

Sharplink, a digital asset treasury company focused on ether, is winning favor with Wall Street analysts as it evolves how it generates returns for shareholders.

The company is partnering with the crypto investment manager Galaxy Digital to help it boost yields on the ether it holds, Sharplink announced during its first-quarter financial update. A new joint fund will allocate $125 million across decentralized finance liquidity protocols and other onchain income-generating strategies.

The move gives Sharplink yield opportunities beyond staking revenue – which is income investors earn by locking up ether to help secure the Ethereum network and receiving rewards in return. The company can also expand beyond its ether stockpiler role by giving investors more of an active management flavor.

That echoes a theme that the original crypto accumulator, Michael Saylor’s Strategy, hit on in its earnings update last week: it’s time to break from Saylor’s “never sell” bitcoin mantra in favor of maximizing shareholder returns through more active management. On Wednesday, Citi analyst Peter Christiansen said there’s “a lot to like” about Strategy, beginning with “increasing active management.”

At its core, the trend is about decoupling investor returns from down or quiet markets like crypto had in the first quarter. Ether has lost 23% this year, alongside bitcoin’s 8% drop over the same period.

Each of the eight analysts covering Sharplink has a buy rating on the stock, and the average price target predicts shares could rise 156%, according to LSEG.

The Galaxy partnership is “the template for future external allocations and a credibility marker” that could make investors value the company more highly if they see proof Sharplink is earning those extra returns, B.Riley analyst Fedor Shabalin said in a note Monday.

“The strategy reads as disciplined progression along the efficient frontier rather than yield-chasing,” he added.

TD Cowen analyst Lance Vitanza also invoked the word “discipline,” underscoring the fine line between smart yield generation and speculative risk-taking.

″The Galaxy partnership reflects a disciplined setup in capital productivity, supporting a constructive setup for the shares,” Vitanza wrote in a note.

At Canaccord Genuity, analyst Joseph Vafi said Sharplink is an “underappreciated ETH treasury company taking solid and differentiated strategic steps,” adding that it “could outshine other ETH [digital asset treasurys] over time in yield generation.”

The company initially launched as SharpLink Gaming in 2019 but pivoted to its ether treasury focus last year at the height of a crypto craze that saw dozens of companies attempting to replicate Strategy’s playbook with other cryptocurrencies. During that pivot, Ethereum cofounder Joseph Lubin joined as the chairman. Later in the year, Joseph Chalom, a BlackRock veteran who led the firm’s digital asset group at the time of the U.S. bitcoin ETF launches, was named CEO.

The company’s main competitor is the larger Bitmine, the ether treasury company chaired by Fundstrat’s Tom Lee."

This was the conclusion of his paid service. He really hate chasing rallies but said after talking to Amazon he thinks it's not too late.

I'm not a Cramer hater and in fact made lots of money riding his early Nvidia calls. He's also been right on GEV, LLY, Apple, etc. But he definitely missed the memory trade.

His other big call was TSM. He said TSM missing some business from Apple was actually a good thing, because now they can use that capacity for other people (newer customers) who they can charge more.

It's fine if you guys think you'll be the first one to make the "inverse Cramer" joke here. But please along with the jokes add in some of your own analysis I'm actually curious if you think this call indicates the top or just the beginning.

Disclosure: I'm gonna buy some DRAM but wheel it, not stay too long.