Key takeaways:
- BitMine’s aggressive ETH accumulation reinforced $1,500 support despite $8 billion in unrealized losses.
- The Glamsterdam update and the launch of Robinhood Chain signal a stronger focus on TradFi in Ethereum’s base layer.
The price of Ether (ETH) has surged 15% in five days, distancing itself from its June 26 low of $1,500. Part of the improvement in investor sentiment can be attributed to the final tests of the Glamsterdam Ethereum upgrade, scheduled for later in 2026. Moreover, BitMine Immersion Technologies’ continued Ether accumulation has helped strengthen support levels. Will $2,000 be next?
Total cryptocurrency capitalization/USD (left) vs. ETH/USD (right). Source: TradingView
Ether has outperformed the total cryptocurrency market capitalization by 7% over the last 30 days. Some of the excitement came from optimism about the passage CLARITY Digital Assets Acta bill that has faced several hurdles in Congress after opposition from the banking industry over regulation of stablecoins and potential rewards for their holders.
ETH options with 25% delta skew (put-call) at Deribit. Source: Lightness
Ether’s recent rally towards $1,800 was enough to instill some confidence in ETH options markets as the put-call indicator exceeded the level of fear that had prevailed through Friday. The current premium of 9% for put (put) options compared to equivalent call (call) instruments is far from bullish, but distances itself from the previous week’s 15% level. Levels above 12% usually indicate extreme fear.
Ethereum Network Update, Robinhood Chain Behind ETH Price Rally
One of the main criticisms of Ethereum concerns its scalability using Layer 2 rollups aided by data packets (blobs), which have drastically reduced transaction fees but sparked fierce debates about long-term censorship and data centralization. Base layer network fees have been a huge success, which in turn has reduced ETH burn and ultimately led to inflationary supply dynamics.
Ethereum base layer network monthly revenue, USD. source: DefiLlama
Ethereum Glamsterdam updatecurrently in testing, should improve the network’s processing speed by allowing more transactions to be processed in parallel. The proposal will also raise Ethereum’s ability to handle more data at higher bandwidth and reduce database bloat. One of the goals is to provide institutional-grade infrastructure for financial applications.
BitMine (BMNR US) ETH shares held and issued. Source: bmnr.rocks
Continued accumulation by US-listed company BitMine Immersion has likely helped strengthen the $1,500 support. The company increased its shares by 325,000 ETH in the last monthincreasing its reserves to 5.74 million ETH. Regardless of the current $8 billion in unrealized ETH holding losses, BitMine continues on its path towards acquiring 5% of the existing supply.
Related: Vitalik Buterin shares the priorities of the novel “Lean Ethereum” strawmap.
The July 2 launch of Robinhood Chain, Ethereum’s EVM-compatible Layer 2 built using Arbitrum technology, helped consolidate the ecosystem with the classic financial industry. More importantly, Robinhood has deployed tokenized stock trading in over 120 countries with major decentralized finance (DeFi) integrations including Uniswap, 1inch, and Morpho.
While Ethereum onchain and derivatives metrics paint a somewhat bearish picture with low network fees and low confidence in options markets, Ethereum’s upside is growth in real-world classic finance utilize cases and network improvements capable of significantly increasing base layer capacity. Overall, the path to $2,000 ETH seems entirely feasible in the near term.
