Why is Ethereum falling against Bitcoin? Maxis loudly celebrate but miss the point

Key Takeaways

• Ethereum has fallen against Bitcoin thus far this year
• This is unusual as the market has risen, and altcoins tend to outperform Bitcoin in bull markets
• Nonetheless, Bitcoin maxis represent everything that is and about the space, writes our Analyst Dan Ashmore
• Their celebrations also forget the fact that Ethereum has still crushed Bitcoin over the past five years
• Despite Ethereum’s outperformance, Ashmore explains why Bitcoin remains the only crypto asset for him, despite his disdain of Bitcoin maximalism

I am a Bitcoin investor. But there are few things more toxic in the cryptocurrency space than Bitcoiners persecuting others for investing in different coins. 

Of course, the people who do this are only a tiny minority. Colloquially known as Bitcoin maximalists, this group are just so damn loud and aggressive that it makes it seem as if they are plenty in number. They’re not.

Do I personally invest in cryptos beyond Bitcoin? Not really, beyond a bit of fun on the side. I’m a bit of a boomer investor and hence altcoins have never made it into my long-term portfolio. But that doesn’t mean I have to spend my nights berating people online for whatever they do with their money. It’s really strange behaviour. 

Ethereum the biggest target

Ethereum, being the second biggest cryptocurrency on the planet, is naturally the biggest target of these maxis, who typically travel in packs through the virtual world, but are rarely seen outside of the Internet in broad daylight.  

And Ethereum is the reason I am crafting this piece today because Twitter, which is the always-positive kingdom in which these maxis are most commonly found, is alive with celebrations that Bitcoin is accelerating against Ethereum, with the latter falling sharply in the last few days and close to its lows this year against Bitcoin. 

A couple of things on this. And again, I am a Bitcoin investor so I don’t really have any reason to be biased here (or if anything, I do in the opposite direction). 

But sharing the 2023 chart is guilty of a little bit of cherry-picking. It is no secret that over the last few years, throughout the bull market surge of the pandemic years in 2020 and 2021, Ethereum has absolutely crushed Bitcoin. 

Since April 2020, it is up 2.53X against Bitcoin, to be precise. 

Ethereum, like most altcoins, tends to…