Will Ethereum Whale Selloff Trigger ETH Price Crash Under $2,800?

Ethereum (ETH) price has crashed over 11% dropping under $3,300 in the last 24 hours amid selloff by the Ethereum whale entities as well as the Ethereum Foundation. With ETH falling under the crucial support of $3,500 today, there have been heavy liquidations of long positions with analysts expecting the next support around $2,800.

Ethereum Whales Selloff in Massive Quantity

Amid the broader crypto market crash, Ethereum whale entities have resolved to major selloff leading to negative sentiment around the asset. Blockchain analytics platform Lookonchain reported that one whale deposited 22,746 ETH, worth $77.7 million, to Binance earlier today and withdrew stablecoins in order to repay the debts on Aave and Spark.

Over the last two days, this same whale has deposited a total of 31,968 ETH, valued at $122.3 million, into Binance. In another instance, a separate whale transferred 49,910 ETH, worth $170 million, to Binance in the past eight hours and subsequently withdrew $137.8 million in stablecoins.

Thus, the ongoing turbulence in the crypto market has triggered large-scale liquidations in Ethereum with investors forced to pay their debts. Following the rejection at $4,000, the ETH price has corrected more than 17.5% as of the current price.

Just two days before when ETH was trading at $4,000, the Ethereum Foundation sold off another 100 ETH from its holdings. This shows a strategic sale by the Foundation at the top.

Data shows that over the past year, the Ethereum Foundation has executed 32 trades, selling a total of 4,466 ETH worth approximately $12.6 million. Notably, 15 of these trades were conducted at or near market peaks, as per the data from Arkham Intelligence.

Apart from Ethereum whale selloff, the spot Ethereum ETFs saw $60 million in outflows on Thursday after several days of consecutive inflows. Grayscale’s ETHE contributed to a majority of the outflows at $58 million.

Will ETH Price Crash to $2,800 Again?

Crypto market analysts have turned bearish on Ethereum expecting the ETH price to drop $2,800 and a bit below for re-accumulation. Popular crypto analyst Caleb Franzen shared an inverse head-and-shoulders pattern for Ethereum showing that it’s on a downward trajectory to hit another low of $3,000, and could bounce off from there to $4,000 levels.

“Now that we’re getting rejected at the YTD highs, all I see is the opportunity to produce the final phase of the inverse head & shoulders setup,” he noted.

This year in 2024, Ethereum has largely underperformed other altcoins testing investors’ patience. However, the Ethereum bulls believe that once ETH crosses $4,100, the surge to an all-time high will be very fast. Popular crypto analyst Ted Pillows noted:

“$4K seems like the new $1.4K for Ethereum. In the 2020-21 cycle, ETH got rejected from $1,400 several times before a successful breakout. Right now, the same thing is happening with the $4K level, but there’ll be a breakout soon. Once $ETH closes above $4.1K, a new ATH will happen in no time”.

Despite Ethereum whale selloff, the Ethereum options data from Deribit shows that not everything is bad for ETH at the moment. A total of 173,000 ETH options expired recently, carrying a notional value of $590 million. The options featured a Put/Call ratio of 0.5, indicating a higher volume of bullish call positions compared to bearish puts. The max pain price—a level where most options lose value—is at $3,750, reflecting a key area of interest for traders and market participants.

As of press time, the Ethereum price is trading 11.21% down at $3,264 levels with its market cap falling under $400 billion. As per the Coinglass data, the open interest dropped by 10.53% slipping under $25 billion. The 24-hour liquidation has also surged to $226 million of which $198 million is in long liquidation.