Both Bitcoin and Ethereum started the year higher than they will probably end the year. Yet many digital asset insiders anticipate a gangbuster 2026 as sentiment shifts and renewed interest in crypto takes hold.

For Ethereum in 2025 on January 1st, it was valued at around $3331, reaching an all-time high of $4951 in August. Currently, Ethereum is trading at around $2984.

Kevin Rusher, founder of RAAC, a real-world-asset (RWA) lending and borrowing ecosystem, predicts that 2026 could be the year for Ethereum as it becomes the top crypto perhaps driving gains for ETH holders.

“2026 could be the year Ethereum blindsides the market.”

Rusher states that while some myopic pundits are hyper-focused on ETH’s price, they are missing the significant institutional adoption that is cementing Ethereum as “the new king of crypto.”

“Over Christmas, stablecoin issuance on Ethereum surpassed $59 billion, placing the chain well ahead of any other as it has gobbled up over 62% of the market,”  says Rusher. “Meanwhile, Ethereum is the only chain of note in the tokenized asset sector, which is, perhaps, the only crypto asset class to have seen exponential growth in 2025 (over 220%). Ethereum hosts $12.5 billion in tokenized assets, giving the chain over 65% share of the entire market. The closest competitor is BNB Chain with a measly $2 billion, while both Solana and Arbitrum host less than $1 billion of tokenized assets each.”

Rusher states that during the holidays, tokenized gold topped $4 billion on Ethereum, up from $1 billion at the beginning of the year. The “gold rush” in tokenized gold is taking place “almost exclusively on Ethereum.”

“… With Central Banks and investors scrambling to get in any way they can, this growth is going in only one direction,” predicts Rusher.

He explains that while the price of ETH may be down, the flows tell a different story: while Bitcoin inflows halved in 2025 compared to 2024, inflows into ETH doubled.

Rusher points to a State Street study showing that 6% of institutions holding digital assets hold more than 5% in ETH, with just 5% holding BTC above this level. He says that 3X as many asset managers as retail holders own ETH.

“And to top this off, we have a report from Artemis showing that business-to-business (B2B) payments on Ethereum spiked by 157% last year, with the size of B2B payments increasing by 45% and accounting for the lion’s share of transaction value on the chain,” Rusher states.

Rusher is a Bitcoin bear, predicting that betting on Bitcoin for growth as an asset for 2026 will be “blindsided by the massive growth we are going to see on Ethereum, fuelled by stablecoins, tokenization and payments, all of which institutions are soaking up as if there were no tomorrow.”