Is Ethereum the Foundation of Global Finance? $15,000 Target

Recently increasing institutional interest is raising expectations for the price of Ethereum (ETH). The founders of Etherealize, Vivek Raman and Danny Ryan, state that the preference of large financial institutions for Ethereum has the potential to radically revalue the markets.

The founders emphasize that giants such as BlackRock, Fidelity, and JPMorgan have chosen Ethereum for their on-chain moves. Raman expressed that institutions are focusing on renewing the market infrastructure directly, rather than engaging in short-term speculative areas. The nearly 100% uptime of Ethereum and its advantage in creating counterparty risk are among the key reasons behind this preference.

Recent developments regarding regulations in the U.S. are also noteworthy. In particular, the GENIUS Act legalizes the use of stablecoins on public blockchains, reducing uncertainties for banks and brokerage firms. This situation has accelerated the transition of assets such as tokenized money market funds to Ethereum, amounting to billions of dollars. BlackRock's BUIDL fund has been launched on Ethereum and has surpassed $2 billion. JPMorgan announced its first tokenized money market fund on Ethereum with an initial $100 million in December.

Raman indicated that these developments point to a growth potential from a regular market value to trillions of dollars, arguing that the price of Ethereum could reach $15,000 by the end of 2026. This prediction is based on factors such as a five-fold growth in the stablecoin market, the expansion of tokenized real-world assets, and Ethereum becoming a permanent value storage tool similar to Bitcoin.

Ryan states that the Ethereum network has all the necessary scaling solutions for institutional use and that the network's capacity has significantly increased with recent protocol updates. Additionally, he points out that the need for privacy has been addressed with zero-knowledge proofs. Etherealize continues to develop ZK-based infrastructures that allow institutions to conduct private transactions on a public ledger.

In summary, Ethereum is positioned not only as a cryptocurrency but also as a long-term solution that constitutes the infrastructure of the global financial system.