In a report on Tuesday, Bitwise said that the second-largest cryptocurrency, Ethereum, appears to be unpopular right now, but as the year draws to a close, Ethereum's underperformance could be reversed. Ethereum is little changed so far this year, while Bitcoin is up 38% and Solana is up 31%. The report says Ethereum's recent underperformance stems from risks associated with the November US Presidential Election, increased competition from Solana and other blockchains, challenges in token economics, and mixed reactions to the launch of spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the United States. "Ethereum has the most active developers, the most active users, and a market cap five times larger than its closest competitor," wrote Matt Hougan, chief investment officer at Bitwise. "It's like Microsoft (MSFT) in the blockchain space," Hogan wrote. Everyone wants to talk about newer companies and their game-changing technologies, such as Google (GOOG), Slack (WORK) and Zoom (ZM), "but Microsoft is still bigger than all of them combined."