In a recent period, ETH broke through its multi-month trading range, with prices briefly topping above $2,800 and setting a new high since 2026. At the same time, BTC’s performance has been relatively muted, and crypto-related equities such as MSTR have not seen gains comparable on a year-over-year basis. This stands in sharp contrast to the market’s prior widely held view that a “hawkish macro backdrop combined with regulatory uncertainty” would suppress risk assets.
The first core source of this mismatch lies in a gap in expectations at the regulatory level. Previously, the market generally believed that for the CFTC to regulate crypto assets, it would require congressional legislative authorization. After the CLARITY Act failed in a Senate vote, people expected the regulatory process to be significantly delayed. But the reality is that the CFTC has not stopped related actions. Recently, rulemaking for Ethereum staking services and DeFi products—via requests for public comment—has continued to move forward normally. This expectation gap, that regulation can progress even without congressional authorization, has been interpreted by some funds as a signal that the regulatory framework is gradually becoming clearer, which has become a key factor supporting ETH’s independent rally.
A second common misinterpretation comes from the amplification of whale activity on-chain. Recently, on-chain data showing a large whale address swapping BTC for staking ETH has been interpreted by some institutions as “capital rotating from BTC to ETH.” However, the actions of a single address are merely individual behavior. Misreading such single-address activity as a trend signal has been common in past market moves, and the market often amplifies it into a signal of a broader trend—only for it to be disproven eventually. Current overall on-chain data shows that the number of addresses holding BTC and ETH, as well as the frequency of large transfers, have not exhibited any systemic rotation characteristics. ETH’s rise is more about in-market competition among existing capital rather than an influx of incremental capital, which is another key reason for the mismatch with expectations of a “trend-driven”行情.
The suppression at the macro level has not been fully effective, which is also related to changes in the current capital structure in the crypto market. Although the Federal Reserve has signaled a more hawkish path for subsequent rate hikes, and the U.S. dollar index has strengthened, and traditional risk assets such as U.S. tech stocks have also adjusted, the crypto market currently has mostly high-risk speculative capital. As a result, their marginal sensitivity to macro liquidity has declined; instead, they are more focused on marginal changes in regulatory policy. This difference in capital characteristics is uncommon in past macro-loosening cycles, and it is an important reason why the ETH price action and expectations have diverged this time.
To determine whether the current rise in ETH is sustainable, three verification signals need to be watched: first, whether the implementation strength of the CFTC’s subsequent regulatory rules exceeds market expectations; second, whether there is a continuous on-chain transfer of BTC holdings into ETH—not just sporadic actions by a single whale address; and third, whether the Federal Reserve’s subsequent monetary policy genuinely results in implemented rate hikes. If rate hikes are carried out, can ETH withstand the macro-level suppression? In addition, the near-term performance of BTC-heavy holdings such as MSTR is still highly correlated with BTC. If ETH develops an independent price trend and continues, the performance of these two types of assets may diverge noticeably.