Key takeaways:
-
ETH falls to a 4-month low despite recent layer-2 growth cutting base fees and boosting Ethereum’s use in tokenization and stablecoin.
-
ETH may recover as global risks ease and new liquidity enters markets, helping the price move back toward $3,900.
Ether (ETH) crashed below $3,000 on Monday, and the drop reflects a sector-wide risk-off shift where traders are worried that the bull run may have ended after a 40% correction from the $4,956 all-time high in August.
Ether’s performance has closely tracked the altcoin market, signaling a lack of asset-specific catalysts or at least traders’ shift toward broader macroeconomic factors. If Ether faced clear competitive pressure or weakening fundamentals, ETH would likely lag altcoins, which has not happened.
Analysts argue the crypto downturn stems from rising concern over global growth. The US government shutdown and new import tariffs were followed by weak consumer-sector earnings and doubts surrounding the artificial intelligence industry. Data centers now deal with higher costs and energy constraints, even as the business remains highly profitable.
Demand for bullish ETH leverage has stayed muted for a month, with the futures premium stuck under the 5% neutral level. Part of this hesitation comes from how market stress affects companies building ETH reserves, including Bitmine Immersion (BMNR US), SharpLink Gaming (SBET US) and The Ether Machine (ETHM US).
Those companies focused on ETH reserves through debt and equity issues now hold unrealized losses as their shares trade below net asset value, which includes crypto holdings. Even if no forced selling is imminent, investor interest in the sector drops, reducing demand for new debt and causing gradual dilution for current holders.
Falling Ethereum onchain activity dampened bullish appetite
Ether’s weak onchain data has also hurt investors’ bullish appetite. Lower network activity reduces demand for ETH and lifts supply. Ethereum’s burn mechanism only becomes meaningful when demand for base layer data rises, so slower DApp usage is a net negative for ETH staking.
Deposits on the Ethereum network, measured by Total Value Locked (TVL), fell to a four-month low of $74 billion, a 13% drop from 30 days earlier. Activity on Ethereum decentralized exchanges (DEX) reached $17.4 billion in the past seven days, down 27% from the prior month. Ethereum remains the clear leader in deposits, but it faces tougher competition in trading volume.
Critics may argue that BNB Chain and Solana are more centralized, and that Ethereum leads once the layer-2 ecosystem is taken into account. Scaling solutions like Base, Arbitrum and Polygon greatly improved Ethereum’s capacity, but also raised concerns over fees. Because rollups batch and process transactions off the base layer, they sharply reduce demand for base layer fees.
Related: Republic raises $100M for ETH purchases under unusual zero-interest deal
Still, the shift of activity toward layer-2s is far from a threat. The rise of Ethereum’s scaling ecosystem has strengthened its lead in Real World Asset (RWA) tokenization and in decentralized stablecoin systems such as Sky, formerly known as MakerDAO. Base alone processed nearly 102 million transactions in the past seven days, a figure comparable to networks with many more users and deposits, such as Solana.
Ether’s outlook depends heavily on lower global socio-political uncertainty, especially as the US faces pressure from its expanding government debt. Eventually, central banks will likely need to add liquidity and support their economies, and ETH is well-positioned to benefit from that inflow. Such a shift could be enough for Ether to retest the $3,900 level.
This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.