What to know : Fundstrat's Tom Lee said the crypto winter is over if bitcoin posts a third consecutive monthly gain in May, closing above $76,000. Stablecoins and tokenized assets are becoming the core infrastructure for AI-driven finance, Lee said. Crypto-native financial firms could overtake legacy banks within the next decade, he said.
The crypto bear market is likely over, arguing that a fresh cycle driven by tokenization and artificial intelligence-powered financial services is beginning to take shape, said Tom Lee, chairman of Bitmine (BMNR) and co-founder of Fundstrat.
Speaking at Consensus 2026 in Miami on Thursday, Lee pointed to bitcoin's recent strength as a historical signal that the market leaving behind the downtrend that saw prices crater from $126,000 in October to $60,000 in February.
After positive monthly returns in March and April, BTC is up another roughly 5% in May so far, which would be the third consecutive positive monthly return.
"You have never in a bear market if bitcoin closes up three consecutive months," Lee said. "If bitcoin closes above $76,000 this month, the bear market is definitively over."
The CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index closed April at $76,300, while the asset is currently trading just below $80,000.
Lee said investors remain psychologically anchored to the last crypto downturn and are underestimating the strength of the current rebound. He also pointed to bullish technical signals from veteran trader John Bollinger, who recently said his trend models had turned positive on bitcoin.
Adding to the bullish narrative, Lee noted that software stocks — a sector that was battered amid concerns of AI disrupting its business model and Fundstrat recently upgraded — have historically traded in close correlation with bitcoin. Since tensions escalated between the U.S. and Iran, Lee added, crypto assets have outperformed most traditional markets, with ether (ETH) leading gains.
Tokenization and AI agents driving next cycle
Fueling the next bull market in crypto are two megatrends that are disrupting finance: all assets migrating onchain called tokenization and artificial intelligence (AI) agents using blockchain rails.
Lee argued that AI agents are going to need money to move value autonomously, and for that they will increasingly rely on blockchain networks and tokenized financial systems.
He pointed to stablecoin adoption as evidence the transition is already underway. Stablecoin transaction volumes have already surpassed Visa payments, he said, while he pointed to Grayscale's report that the $300 trillion securities market will eventually migrate to blockchain rails as tokenized assets.
"The networks that host a large share of tokenized activity are going to capture the economic value," Lee said.
That shift could radically reshape the economics of finance itself, he argued. Lee compared JPMorgan — projected to earn roughly $60 billion this year with 300,000 employees — to firms like stablecoin issuer Tether and trading giant Jane Street, which generate similar profit levels with just a fraction of the workforce.
"Native digital companies using blockchain as settlement eliminate a lot of processes and people," he said.
In Lee's view, crypto-native financial firms could increasingly resemble the internet companies that displaced legacy media and telecom giants over the past two decades.
"In 10 years, half of the largest financial institutions in the world will be native digital," he said.
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