Over 33 Million ETH Staked As Spot Ethereum ETFs Roll Out: Up Next $4,000?

Ethereum is outperforming Bitcoin at spot rates, holding firm above the support zone between $3,000 and $3,300. Although prices retraced yesterday, with the July 29 bar closing with a long upper wick pointing to weakness, ETH holders are upbeat, expecting gains above $4,000.

As Ethereum rejects lower lows and cements its place at second in the market cap leaderboard, other developments could spark demand in the coming sessions.

Taking to X, analyst Leon Waidmann noted that a record 28% of all ETH in circulation has been locked, an all-time high. According to CryptoQuant data, as of July 29, 33.3 million ETH were locked.

Parallel data from Beaconcha.in reveals that there are over one million validators. At the same time, over 33.6 million ETH have been staked. Additionally, of all the validators helping secure and process transactions, each operating node has locked 32.06 ETH on average.

While more ETH continues to be staked, on-chain data also reveals that holders are concurrently pulling more coins from leading exchanges. As of July 30, CryptoQuant data shows that all crypto exchanges held just 16.6 million ETH. It is down from the 32.5 million under their control three years ago in July 2021.

Usually, the more ETH is pulled from exchanges, the more confident holders are. Through Binance or Coinbase, users can easily swap tokens for other assets, including Bitcoin or stablecoins. Given this, that they are moving their coins away from these platforms means either they are keen on holding or engaging in other ecosystem activities like decentralized finance (DeFi) via portals like Maker or even staking for an annual yield.

The combination of ETH moving from exchanges and holders choosing to stake makes the coin more scarce. Moreover, the availability of spot Ethereum ETFs in the United States is also expected to increase the demand for ETH. Therefore, as the coin becomes scarce, demand from this derivative product may push prices higher.

From the daily chart, ETH has found resistance at $3,500. If the coin finds support from around the $3,000 to $3,300 zone, ETH may likely float higher.