Ethereum is struggling below $3,000, but whales are once again accumulating more tokens. Several large entities withdrew ETH from Binance.
Despite the ETH price downturn, accumulation continues into whale wallets and general accumulation addresses.
More large-scale entities withdrew Ethereum from Binance in the past day. Three newly created wallets added thousands of ETH, further depleting Binance reserves. On-chain data shows the whales added more than 8,000 ETH in hours.
Ethereum demand remains relatively strong, as buyers often offset the newly created weekly tokens. The network produces around 17,000 ETH each week, with most of the supply absorbed by buyers, and a small part burned by smart contracts.
After the latest withdrawals, Binance’s reserves remained at around 3.88M ETH. In total, exchanges hold a record low of 16.22M ETH, as more tokens are retained in smart contracts or in long-term staking.
Binance is not the only hub for Ethereum distribution. Other whales are using Hyperliquid for both spot orders and aggressive long positions. Another buyer added 2,249 ETH during the latest dip below $3,000.
The influential Arthur Hayes moved around 508 ETH to Galaxy Digital with the potential to sell.
Current ETH activity remains driven by whales and large-scale DeFi users. Ethereum on-chain activity is slower, and retail traders have moved away from the chain, while whales remain active.
The recent buying happened as the Ethereum fear and greed index recovered to 42 points and is already neutral, after spending weeks in deep fear territory.
Can Ethereum trading recover?
Ethereum open interest inched up from $17.4B to $17.7B in the past few days. However, the increase is mostly due to whale positioning. ETH retail trading remains subdued, with minimal expectations for a rally.
Despite this, whales are repositioning, and some are still holding aggressive long positions. Based on currently deployed liquidity, ETH is in a range between $3,000 and $2,700, with a larger accumulation of long positions.
Even the whale that shorted the market before October 11 holds the biggest long position on Hyperliquid, with a notional value of $600M. The whale, identified as Everett Jin, has continued to post collateral, despite carrying $39M in unrealized gains.
Over time, the whale expanded the long position, signaling at least speculative expectation that ETH may recover. Other whales on Hyperliquid have retained smaller positions after getting liquidated, with only two whales opening positions valued at over $100M.
ETH may close 2025 in the red
ETH is down over 11.5% in the year to date and may close in the red for the first time since 2022.
To date in December, ETH is down 1.48% after losing a net 28.9% for the quarter to date. Despite this, the October liquidations still weigh on the market.
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