Tom Lee’s Bullish Call: Why Bitcoin, Ethereum, and XRP Are Primed for a Year-End Surge

Wall Street's favorite crypto strategist just flipped the switch to 'risk-on.'

The Macro Tailwind No One's Talking About

Forget the day-to-day noise. The real story is a structural shift in capital allocation. Institutional portfolios, long underweight digital assets, are finally making their move. It's not a trickle—it's a tide turning as year-end rebalancing meets a fear-of-missing-out frenzy from traditional finance.

Bitcoin: The Digital Bedrock

The flagship asset isn't just sitting there. It's acting as the market's anchor, absorbing sell pressure and signaling broader strength. Every dip gets bought, not by retail speculators, but by entities with balance sheets that would make a central bank blush.

Ethereum & XRP: The Niche Players

Ethereum's rally isn't about memecoins anymore. It's a bet on a new internet backbone. Meanwhile, XRP's moves hint at settlements happening behind closed doors—the kind of boring, multi-billion-dollar plumbing that Wall Street loves. Their momentum isn't independent; it's a leveraged bet on Bitcoin's dominance holding firm.

The Cynical Take

Of course, this all assumes the traditional finance playbook still applies—where 'year-end' means window dressing and performance chasing. In crypto, a month is a lifetime, and a rally can be built and demolished between Christmas and New Year's. It's the same old herd mentality, just with a digital coat of paint.

The stage is set. Liquidity is searching for a home, and these three assets are holding the door wide open. Whether this is the start of a new macro trend or just the last gasp of the annual bonus cycle, the next few weeks will separate the strategic bets from the reckless gambles.

Fundstrat’s co-founder and market strategist Tom Lee remains calm even when markets get shaky. And despite a bumpy start to December, he predicts Bitcoin, Ethereum and the overall crypto market are gearing up for a strong year-end move.

Two weeks ago, Lee warned that markets could face turbulence before turning higher — and that is exactly what happened. Now, he says the setup for a December rally is stronger than ever.

Why Tom Lee Thinks a Crypto Rally Is Coming

The Federal Reserve Is Turning Supportive

According to Lee, the biggest catalyst for both stocks and crypto is monetary policy.

• The Fed is expected to cut interest rates in December.
  
• Quantitative Tightening (QT) has officially ended, a process where the Fed had been shrinking its balance sheet since April 2022.
  
• The last time QT ended, in September 2019, markets rallied more than 17% in just three weeks.
  

Lee says the end of QT effectively marks the beginning of a liquidity boost, similar to early Quantitative Easing (QE). More liquidity usually means more demand for risk assets like Bitcoin, ethereum and XRP.

November’s Market Reset Cleared Excess Leverage

Lee points out that November’s drop wasn’t just normal volatility,  it was a major reset of leverage, especially in crypto.

• Crypto saw a “wipeout” of overleveraged positions in October and November.
  
• Similar events in the past, like the FTX collapse in 2022, took multiple weeks for sentiment to recover.
  
• Lee believes crypto is now 7–8 weeks past the shock, and “fully washed out.”
  

This cleansing of Leveraged positions, he says, builds the foundation for a healthier uptrend.

Seasonal Strength and Year-End FOMO

Historically, December is one of the strongest months for both equities and crypto.

Lee says many fund managers became extremely cautious after November’s sell-off,  and now risk being left behind if markets bounce. This creates performance chasing, which often pushes prices higher in the final weeks of the year.