The price of Ethereum struggles to gain momentum, with the ETH/BTC pair underperforming and hitting new lows, sparking concerns among analysts.
Ethereum’s price has shown minor signs of recovery today, hovering around $2,375 at press time. This represents a 1.06% increase in the last 24 hours, but the crypto has seen a sharp decline of 10.47% over the past week.
Amid these fluctuations, a significant underperformance has been noted in the ETH/BTC trading pair, which has attracted considerable attention from market watchers.
Declining Performance of ETH/BTC Pair
In a recent analysis, Michaël van de Poppe, founder of MN Consultancy, pointed out that the ETH/BTC pair has been rejected again at a crucial level and is back at the lows. Consequently, Van de Poppe described Ethereum’s performance against Bitcoin as “the most disgusting” chart he has seen in a while.
He expressed frustration that despite Ethereum’s fundamental growth, it struggles to gather momentum to outperform Bitcoin. With Ethereum’s price revisiting previous lows amid the latest market correction, he raised questions about what might unfold next, especially if Ethereum tests its bottom.
Notably, the accompanying chart points to a 30% price drop in Ethereum against Bitcoin in recent months. At the time of his posting, the pair was trading at approximately 0.03883 BTC. However, updated records show it has declined further to 0.03877 BTC.
Nonetheless, Van de Poppe identifies a key rejection at the 0.05151 BTC level, which he notes is crucial for a potential trend reversal.
Chart by Michaël van de Poppe
Selling Pressure Holding Back Ethereum
Notably, Ethereum’s challenges in the market are underscored by a marked increase in large-scale selling by early investors.
A notable whale wallet, which had been dormant for two years, began offloading substantial amounts of ETH in October. Over the past week, the wallet sold 19,000 ETH, valued at approximately $47.54 million.
Originally, this wallet received 150,000 ETH during Ethereum’s initial coin offering (ICO) in 2015, when the price per coin was just $0.31. This investment grew from $46,500 to over $358 million in value.
The whale’s selling spree commenced on October 1, with 9,000 ETH sold at prices above $2,600. The selling continued on October 3, with an additional 10,000 ETH offloaded as the price fell to $2,380.
In recent weeks, The Crypto Basic has reported several instances of Ethereum ICO whales moving millions of dollars after nearly a decade of dormancy to cash out. Additionally, the Ethereum Foundation has also been actively selling ETH this year.
Remarkably, these sales have been strategic, often occurring during significant bull runs in ETH prices. These developments have likely contributed to Ethereum’s underperformance in recent times.
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