Large Ethereum (ETH) wallets pushed their combined holdings to a 10-week high last week, even as the token slipped back below $2,000 for the first time since late Mar.
Key Points:
- Wallets holding at least 100,000 ETH now control 22.03% of supply, a 10-week high.
- The cohort added more than $2 billion through May even as ETH fell roughly 12%.
- ETH trades back under $2,000, its weakest reading since late March.
Ethereum Whales Lift Holdings
Blockchain analytics firm Santiment reported that wallets holding at least 100,000 ETH now sit on 17.41 million tokens, the most in nine weeks.
That stash equals 22.03% of circulating supply, a fresh 10-week high. At current prices, the 100,000 ETH threshold works out to nearly $200M, so only the deepest pockets qualify.
The same wallets piled on more than $2 billion worth of ETH through May, even as the price fell roughly 12% over the month, a sign large holders treated the slump as a discount. A Glassnode gauge of long-term holder behavior has stayed positive since late February.
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Why Santiment Flags Caution
The firm warned that heavy optimism from retail traders has often preceded steeper losses rather than rebounds. Crowd "buy the dip" calls spread once ETH lost the $2,000 mark. A stronger entry, it said, may only appear once that enthusiasm gives way to panic.
CryptoQuant struck a similar note on Bitcoin (BTC) whales, where buying has stalled since February: "Historically, when both cohorts stall simultaneously, sustained price weakness tends to follow." Smaller "dolphin" wallets have eased off their buying too.
ETH Price Slide Deepens
Ethereum has dropped about 10% this month, a third straight losing week, as institutional outflows and thin network activity sap demand. Treasury firm Bitmine has likely powered much of the whale buying, yet that has not stemmed the bleed.
Capital has drained from ETH since last October, with realized cap sliding from $310 billion to about $295 billion across 2026. The trend points to demand that has yet to return. Nansen analysts have flagged the same soft backdrop.
Even after May's buying, the 100,000-plus ETH group's share has trended lower since Q4 2025, leaving doubt over whether this run can reverse the longer slide. ETH last traded above $2,000 in late Mar., and the latest break caps roughly two months of steady declines.
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