Arthur Hayes says Ethereum could climb to $5,000 within about a year, pointing to Robinhood's use of Ethereum as the security layer for its own blockchain. ETH traded near $2,650 when Hayes made the remarks, meaning the target implies a gain of roughly 89%.
Arthur Hayes, chief investment officer at Maelstrom and co-founder of BitMEX, said Ethereum price could nearly double to $5,000 within roughly a year as Robinhood's use of the network makes it easier for other large financial institutions to adopt. He made the prediction during EastPoint: Seoul 2026, according to media reports on Sept. 28.
Hayes pointed to Robinhood's decision to build its blockchain on Ethereum as a potential catalyst for wider institutional use. According to crypto.news: "Robinhood has started a new narrative for Ethereum." He argued the move gives other large financial companies a reference point when they consider Ethereum for their own infrastructure. Ether traded around $2,650 when Hayes spoke, so reaching his target would require a gain of close to 89%.
Robinhood Chain centers on Ethereum
Robinhood Chain gives Hayes a working example of a large financial company building on Ethereum. The company launched the network's public mainnet on July 1 as an Ethereum Layer 2 built with Arbitrum technology, designed for financial services and tokenized real-world assets including equities and ETFs.
Its documentation says the network uses Ethereum blobs for data availability and ETH as its native gas token, with a canonical bridge connecting the layer 2 directly to Ethereum. By August, Robinhood Chain had recorded nearly $9 billion in cumulative decentralized exchange volume, and BitMine Chairman Tom Lee said the brokerage could potentially connect its 27 million customers with Ethereum-based financial services.
Ethereum price faces $2,800 hurdle before $5,000
Hayes' $5,000 target sits well above levels Ethereum has tested recently. The token rallied from around $2,400 in mid-September and briefly approached $2,800 before sellers pushed it back below $2,700, reaching an intraday high near $2,789 on Sept. 23 before falling as low as $2,648. A sustained break above the $2,800 region would still leave Ether roughly 40% below Hayes' target.
Market conditions have offered some support through fund demand. US spot Ether ETFs recorded $689.8 million in net inflows over five trading sessions from Sept. 21 through Sept. 25, reversing roughly $140.6 million in outflows from the previous week. BlackRock's ETHA fund accounted for $326.2 million of the weekly total, while Fidelity's FETH received $174.1 million.
Staking demand adds another support layer
Ethereum's staking market has shown a further source of demand while the price stays below the $2,800 resistance area. Validator queue data on Sept. 28 showed approximately 1.61 million ETH waiting to enter staking, compared with roughly 161,000 ETH waiting to exit — an entry queue nearly ten times larger than the exit queue.
Around 43.5 million ETH was staked across the network, equal to 35.66% of supply, with 889,387 active validators. Staking removes ETH from immediately liquid supply, though the source notes that ETH entering staking does not by itself establish future price direction.
Hayes' prediction depends in part on institutional use of Ethereum growing beyond Robinhood, which describes its chain as a permissionless network for tokenized real-world assets.
Source: crypto.news
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