Ethereum (ETH) Hits New ATH With Multiple On-Chain Milestones, Liquidity Shortfall, & DeFi Optimism

Just while Bitcoin (BTC) continues its consolidation, Ethereum (ETH) leads the crypto market rally making a solid 15% surge and hitting a new all-time high above $1450. With this move, the Ethereum market cap crosses $163 billion once again with ETH entering the price discovery mode.

Well, it’s not just investor optimism that’s driving the ETH price rally at the moment. In fact, Ethereum has smashed multiple milestones with its on-chain fundamentals getting even stronger and ETH liquidity at exchanges dropping off faster than expected.

Right from ETH non-zero addresses, to ETH retail holders, to ETH whale addresses, all have smashed past new ATH. Moreover, investor confidence in Ethereum continues to surge as Ethereum 2.0 deposit contracts also hit new ATH approaching close to $3 billion. As popular crypto Twitter handle Bloqport reports, here are a few are where on-chain fundamentals for Ethereum have significantly improved.

Ethereum (ETH) Facing Liquidity Crisis & Supply Shortage

Well, just as we saw institutions taking out maximum BTC off the exchanges in early January 2021, the same is happening for Ethereum at this stage. As per data by CryptoQuant, Ethereum registered the largest network outflow with nearly 660K ETH coins leaving exchanges in a single hour on Saturday, January 23. Most of the ETH has supposedly gone either to cold storage or for staking to Ethereum 2.0.

Also, the total number of ETH addresses in profit has hit a new all-time high of 51.9 million as per on-chain data provider Glassnode.

The DeFi Optimism Driving ETH Price

The Ethereum blockchain is host to some of the biggest and a majority of the DeFi applications in the market. As the ETH price hits an all-time high, the total value locked (TVL) in DeFi has all move to a new ATH at $26.56 billion, as per data on DeFiPulse. CEO of Circle Jeremy Allaire says that with Ethereum hitting ATH, DeFi is set to register explosive growth.

With the DeFi optimism all around, Fundstrat Global Advisors’ strategist David Grider said that ETH price can surge 7x from the current levels giving a price target of $10,500. He said:

Ether is “the best risk/reward investment play in crypto. Blockchain computing may be the future of the cloud. Risks include setbacks for the network upgrade or a crypto bear market”.