Tom Lee: Bitcoin’s historical high will be updated in January 2026

Tom Lee, co-founder of analytics company Fundstrat and chairman of BitMine, said he expects a new all-time high in the price of bitcoin BTC $90,420.60 Mezo Wrapped BTC 0.48% Market capitalization $51.32 million VOL. 24 hours $0.54 billion by the end of January 2026. In an interview with CNBC, he noted that he remains «quite optimistic about December,» despite the volatile start to the month. In his opinion, the key to future growth is the recovery of stock markets and a change in the US Federal Reserve’s policy.

Lee emphasized that investors' concerns about the Fed’s hawkish stance had a negative impact on crypto asset valuation models, but that a looser monetary policy («dovish Fed») would be a powerful stimulus for market recovery. After Fed Chairman Jerome Powell’s speech, which cast doubt on the possibility of a rate cut in December, the markets suffered losses. However, the situation has changed — CME futures now estimate the probability of a 0.25% rate cut on December 10 at 87.6%.

Lee’s comments came after bitcoin’s sharp drop to $ 84,000 earlier in the week, caused by liquidations due to the closure of positions as Japanese bond yields rose. The analyst compared the current process of clearing the market of excessive leverage to the 2022 crisis after the FTX crash, noting that a full recovery could take about two weeks.

«We see several supportive factors for the rest of the year — the end of the Fed’s quantitative easing policy and a likely rate cut in December. Fundamentals remain strong, which creates a favorable risk-return ratio,» Lee said in a post-webcast note.

His company BitMine also continues to invest heavily in Ethereum ETH $3,116.27 Bridged Ether (StarkGate) 0.82% Market capitalization $71.47 million VOL. 24 hours $0.48 billion : according to Arkham Intelligence, the firm recently acquired another 7,080 ETH worth about $ 19.8 million, bringing its total holdings to 3.73 million ETH (over $ 10.4 billion), which is more than 3% of the total supply of the token.