This latest sale only added to profit-taking pressure despite the asset’s 52% monthly gain. Short-term holders are driving a lot of the selling, joined by the Ethereum Foundation’s $12.7 million sale. Analysts, including Arthur Hayes, see potential for ETH to climb above $8,500 if Bitcoin hits $150,000, fueled by record spot Ethereum ETF inflows, a $90B TVL milestone, and major capital-raising plans for ETH purchases. Standard Chartered also raised its 2025 ETH target to $7,500, due to strong institutional buying, growing stablecoin dominance under the GENIUS Act, and Vitalik Buterin’s plans to boost layer-1 throughput. Ethereum Whales Sell Big Ethereum (ETH) is seeing heightened market activity as the mysterious whale collective known as “7 Siblings” offloaded $88.2 million worth of ETH in just 15 hours. Blockchain analytics platform Lookonchain revealed that the group, which holds approximately 1.21 million ETH valued at $5.6 billion, sold 19,461 ETH at an average price of $4,532. The whale’s history shows aggressive accumulation earlier in the year, with 103,543 ETH purchased between Feb. 3 and April 7 for $229.7 million at an average of $2,219, including a $42.2 million buy of 24,817 ETH at $1,700 in April. Their activity spans multiple wallets and involves deposits into the Aave v3 lending and borrowing platform. This suggests a deliberate strategy to manage and obscure their large holdings. The sales added to the mounting profit-taking pressure on Ethereum, with short-term holders driving most of the activity. Glassnode data from Monday showed that these traders were realizing around $553 million in daily profits, which was much more than long-term holders who have largely stayed on the sidelines. Although ETH is up 52% in the past month, current profit-taking levels are still 39% lower than last month’s peak when prices hovered near $3,500. Even institutional-linked entities joined in, with the Ethereum Foundation selling 2,795 ETH worth $12.7 million late Tuesday. This reduced its ETH balance to just 99.9 tokens alongside 11.6 million DAI. Despite the selling, sentiment among some prominent market analysts is still bullish. Over the weekend, BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes shared he had bought back into Ethereum just a week after selling $10.5 million worth at $3,507. Analyst Yashasedu projected that ETH could surge above $8,500 if Bitcoin reaches $150,000. This is a reference to historical trends where Ethereum’s market cap ranged between 21.7% and 35% of Bitcoin’s. In such a scenario, ETH could trade between $5,376 and $8,656. The bullish outlook is encouraged by Ethereum’s total value locked surpassing $90 billion, record inflows into spot Ether ETFs totaling $1.01 billion in a single day, and news that BitMine Immersion Technologies plans to raise $20 billion for ETH purchases. Standard Chartered Lifts 2025 ETH Target Standard Chartered also recently sharply raised its Ethereum price forecast for 2025 to $7,500, up from its previous $4,000 target. This is due to a wave of institutional buying and the expected boost from stablecoin adoption after recent US regulatory changes. The bank’s latest report pointed out that Ethereum treasury companies and ETFs acquired 3.8% of all ETH in circulation since early June, which is almost double the fastest rate of Bitcoin accumulation by similar entities during the 2024 US election cycle. Standard Chartered’s ETH price predictions The report pointed to increased engagement from key Ethereum ecosystem players, including the Ethereum Foundation and Etherialize, as a strong positive signal. It also referenced plans by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin to boost layer-1 throughput by 10x, allowing high-value transactions to settle on-chain while routing smaller transfers to layer-2 networks like Arbitrum and Base. Another major driver, according to the bank, is the GENIUS Act, which was passed in July. It provides a clear regulatory framework for stablecoins. Standard Chartered said the legislation is likely to supercharge Ethereum’s dominance in the sector, where stablecoins already account for 40% of all blockchain fees and over half are issued on Ethereum. The bank expects the stablecoin market cap to grow eightfold to $2 trillion by 2028, driving more demand for Ethereum through decentralised finance growth, where ETH commands a 65% share of total value locked. Standard Chartered anticipates that ETH will surpass its previous all-time high by the end of Q3 2025, and also projected that the ETH-BTC ratio will rise from 0.036 to 0.05 as Ethereum’s fundamentals strengthen. Its long-term outlook sees ETH hitting $12,000 in 2026, $18,000 in 2027, and $25,000 by 2028. Currently, ETH is trading at $4,690, just under 5% from its record high of $4,891 in November 2021. ETH’s price action over the past month (Source: CoinMarletCap )
