Former BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes apologized for calling Ethereum (ETH) a shitcoin years ago and said The Merge is "extremely bullish" for ETH's price. In his latest essay, Hayes took a look at his previous statements about Ethereum, as well as looking ahead to discuss the upcoming long-awaited Merge, when Ethereum moves from the current proof-of-work (PoW) to the proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism. As for the past, he apologized for his previous statements, saying: "Readers who have followed my career as an essayist will remember that I talked about ethereum pre-sale. I said it was useless. I was wrong. Please forgive me, O lord!" He referred to his 2018 essay titled "Ether, A Double Digit Shitcoin," in which he predicted that the price of ETH would fall below $100, saying, "And I was right! For a short time..."
In his words, Hayes "became a believer" in 2020, and became "bullish and strong" when he saw a chart showing how ETH's market cap was less than the total market cap of all supported dapps (decentralized apps). "I firmly believe that DeFi offers a credible alternative to the current financial system, and for now, Ethereum is ready to power the world's financial computer." The Merge is "extremely bullish" for the price of ETH He said that The Merge is "extremely bullish" for the price of ETH, but also that it has not yet been listed on the market, writing: "Given all the forced sell-offs that have occurred during the market decline and the bad financial positions that most cryptocurrency investors have been left in, the Merge doesn't seem to be priced and we have an amazing opportunity to raise Ether positions to very attractive levels." Hayes went on to say that he is "more confident than ever today that The Merge will actually happen," particularly as miners are "becoming explicit about its negative impacts." Although he said he did not have the technical expertise to assess whether The Merge will actually happen in September as estimated, Hayes pointed out that "a group of Ethereum network stakeholders who can absolutely hinder the chances of success is the current group of Ethereum miners ." After The Merge, Ethereum miners' machines will become useless unless they can mine on another value chain. Since a well-known miner Chandler Guo has already talked about a hard fork of Ethereum, which would maintain a PoW chain, Hayes said he has made contact with other Chinese miners who have confirmed that this idea is strong in that particular base. In April, Hayes hinted that he could rebalance his investments away from bitcoin (BTC) and in favor of ETH, arguing that "a huge amount of money" will enter ETH once it is seen as an ESG (environmental, social and governance) and fruitful. He said: "When the situation stabilizes at the end of the year, I believe ETH will trade north of 10,000 USD." In the last essay, Hayes reiterated the $10,000 prediction, but did not specify when it might happen. The price of ETH At 09:16 UTC, ETH is trading at 1,658 USD and is up 2% in one day and down 4% in a week. The price jumped 46% in a month, reducing its annual losses to 39%.