Article reprinted from: Odaily Planet Daily
Author: Azuma, Odaily Planet Daily
On December 29, influential trader Eugene Ng Ah Sio in the cryptocurrency community posted on X his outlook and expectations for the first quarter of 2025, predicting that ETH will be the best-performing mainstream token in the next quarter.
Eugene first mentioned three bullish reasons for ETH: technical trends; Trump's favor (especially WLF's large purchases in the Ethereum ecosystem); the development status of the Base ecosystem. He then reiterated that since Trump's election, the inflow of funds into Ethereum spot ETFs has undergone a 180-degree change.
ETF fund trends: Is Ethereum more favored?
Eugene did not exaggerate; SoSoValue data shows that since Trump's victory on November 6, the inflow of funds into spot Ethereum ETFs has significantly increased, and the growth trend even exceeds that of Bitcoin spot ETFs during the same period.
As we enter late December, this trend has become even more apparent.
SoSoValue data shows that last week's trading days (Eastern Time, December 23 to December 27) saw a net inflow of $349 million into Ethereum spot ETFs; meanwhile, Bitcoin spot ETFs experienced a net outflow of $388 million during the same period—this significant difference in fund movement may indicate better expectations for ETH in the future.
As of the publication date, the official ETF inflow/outflow data for this Monday has not been fully released, but according to on-chain monitoring by Lookonchain, yesterday saw a net outflow of 3,000 BTC (approximately $275.59 million) from ten U.S. Bitcoin ETFs; meanwhile, nine Ethereum ETFs saw a net inflow of 16,359 ETH (approximately $5.433 million), and the trend still seems unchanged.
Trump concept all-in-one
In addition to ETF liquidity data, another reason supporting expectations for ETH is the continuous accumulation by the Trump family project WLFI.
In the past period, WLFI has successively bought multiple Ethereum ecosystem tokens such as AAVE, LINK, ENA, and ONDO, but the largest holding of this project remains ETH.
Although this is somewhat related to the fact that WIFI itself is deployed in the Ethereum ecosystem, the phrase 'The president is on board, what are you still hesitating about?' still has a strong FOMO effect.
Looking back at historical data, will the script repeat itself?
Coinglass data shows that in the first quarter of the new year after historical U.S. elections and Bitcoin halving cycles, ETH performed the best, especially in the first quarters of 2017 and 2021, when ETH rose by 518% and 161% respectively, even surpassing BTC's returns in those two quarters (11.9%, 103.2%).
If history repeats itself, ETH may see a significant rise in Q1 of next year.
Potential Beta choice
If ETH can indeed rise as hoped, some Ethereum ecosystem tokens may become higher risk/reward Beta choices, such as:
Trump concept coin combination: AAVE, LINK, ENA, ONDO;
Grayscale Top 20 choices: LINK, UNI, AAVE, ENA, OP, LDO;
Potential benefits of ETF staking expectations: LDO, EIGEN, RPL, SSV;
Top AI concepts in the Ethereum ecosystem: VIRTUAL, GAME, AIXBT;
Odaily Note: The above tokens are only examples of specific sectors and concepts, and do not constitute investment advice.
Opposing viewpoints
Although several well-known investors/traders, including Eugene, have shown a bullish outlook on ETH, there are also voices expressing a pessimistic view on ETH's future performance.
10x Research founder Markus Thielen painted a more pessimistic scenario, predicting that ETH will continue to perform poorly and will not reach historical highs in a 'hawkish' macro environment in 2025: 'We expect a more conservative outlook for ETH in 2025. Unlike previous years, the initial hawkish policies may be tested by weakening liquidity tailwinds.'
During this period of severe market fluctuations, the predictions made by various parties are merely 'one-sided conclusions' based on their respective conditions and indicators; no one can predict the future, so please remember to DYOR before taking action.
