Maelstrom Founder Hayes Bullish on ETH Reaching $5,000 by Year-End, Citing Better Risk-Reward vs BTC

Ether rose 25% this week and may extend gains, with Maelstrom's Arthur Hayes pointing to an attractive risk-reward setup.

Can Positioning and Liquidity Support the Rally?

Maelstrom Chief Investment Officer Hayes told Laura Shin on the Unchained podcast on August 20 that Ether is his largest cryptocurrency position outside of Bitcoin.

His bullish thesis is more tied to market positioning and liquidity.

Hayes expects U.S. Treasury actions, eventual Federal Reserve balance sheet expansion, and similar global monetary policies to inject additional liquidity into financial markets.

He argues that Bitcoin and Ether should be primary beneficiaries.

Bearish sentiment in ETH has left investors underweight, while it still has sufficient liquidity for institutional investors and large funds to build significant positions.

Hayes called Ether the "most hated" large-cap cryptocurrency but views this underperformance as an attractive risk-reward opportunity.

Why Hayes Doesn't Care About Technology

Hayes said his investment thesis does not depend on Ether's layer-2 roadmap, Ethereum Foundation decisions, technology, or tokenomics.

The altcoin remains the world's second-largest cryptocurrency but has yet to reclaim its 2021 all-time high. This leaves significant catch-up room after lagging this cycle and could revisit the $4,800 level reached a year ago.

Hayes expects the trade to become increasingly reflexive once momentum builds, as underweight investors rush back into ETH.

He maintained a $5,000 year-end price target, arguing that Ether could quickly reach that level after breaking through key resistance.

Hayes also believes Ether could potentially serve as a security layer for tokenized real-world assets, though this remains secondary to his macro thesis.