Ethereum Loses 9.2% in a Week as BitMine Caps Purchases at 5% — $2,600 Reclaim Needed to Turn the Trend

Ethereum (ETH-USD) trades at $2,489.10 at 11:35 a.m. ET on Friday, up $54.13 or 2.22% over 24 hours and $80 above Thursday’s low of $2,409.36. The 24-hour range is $2,409.36 to $2,512.13. Market value is $304.1 billion on 122.119 million coins, spot turnover over the past day is $14.18 billion, and Ether’s share of total crypto capitalization is 10.52%.

A green 24-hour number hides a bad week. Ether is down 9.2% over seven days against a 3.7% decline for the crypto market as a whole and 4.8% for Bitcoin. It closed Tuesday at $2,697.98, Wednesday at $2,576.16 and Thursday at $2,474.30. From Tuesday’s close to Thursday’s low it lost 10.7% in under 60 hours. It sits 49.7% below its all-time high of $4,946.05 and 42.9% below the $4,369.60 it fetched one year ago today.

The level that matters is $2,500. That figure was support for most of the past month. It coincided with the 50-day exponential moving average and it broke on Thursday. Friday’s high of $2,512.13 poked $12 above it and failed to hold. Ether is now pressing against that line from underneath, which is how a broken floor becomes a ceiling.

Two things changed for this market in the space of three days, and both remove demand. U.S. spot Ether ETFs have posted eight consecutive days of net outflows totaling more than $637 million. And BitMine Immersion Technologies (BMNR), the company that has bought Ether every single week since June 30, 2025 and now owns 4.93% of all the coins in existence, said on Wednesday it will not go above 5%. It has 89,536 ETH of room left.

That leaves a $304 billion asset without the two buyers that set its marginal price for 15 months, at a moment when leveraged longs have just absorbed $294.6 million in forced liquidations in a day. The bounce to $2,489 is a retest. The forecast below treats it as an opportunity to sell until $2,600 is recovered, with $2,355 the first objective and the September 15 low of $2,360 standing in the same zone.

Three Sessions, Minus 8.3%: How $2,700 Became $2,409

Ether spent two weeks doing very little before it broke. From September 24 through October 6, every daily close landed between $2,668 and $2,727. The range was so tight that the 50-, 75- and 100-period averages on the four-hour chart converged between $2,666 and $2,689.

There was one attempt higher. On October 2 the price reached $2,774.01, its best level since the September recovery topped out at $2,805, and reversed to close at $2,668.69. On Sunday, October 4, it closed at $2,726.97. Monday and Tuesday drifted to $2,709.87 and $2,697.98. On the morning of October 7, $414.1 million of long positions were sitting in liquidation zones just beneath the market.

Wednesday triggered them. Ether opened at $2,697.30, fell through all three four-hour averages in one move and closed at $2,576.16, down 4.52%, with a low of $2,543.77. Volume doubled. The catalyst was partly macro, with Brent crude spiking on Hormuz tanker attacks and the 10-year Treasury yield at a 24-year high, and partly specific: BitMine’s chairman told a conference in Singapore that day that the company would cap its holdings at 5% of supply.

Thursday extended it. The price opened at $2,575.38 and slid to $2,408.36 before closing at $2,474.30, a 3.95% loss on a $180 range. Long liquidations in Ether reached $294.6 million against $57 million of shorts. By one tally Ether’s long-side liquidations of $330 million exceeded Bitcoin’s $285 million over the same 24 hours, in an asset one-fifth the size. Across all of crypto, $1.12 billion was liquidated, $1.05 billion of it longs.

The turn came late Thursday when the U.S. president said there would be no strike on Iran before the November 3 midterm elections and oil eased. Ether was at $2,418.81 at 17:15 UTC and recovered to $2,474 by the close. It opened Friday at $2,474.88, traded a narrow $2,490 to $2,503 band through the European morning, was quoted at $2,493.09 at 6:45 a.m. ET, and reached $2,512.13 before fading.

Three features of that sequence matter for what comes next. The decline accelerated on the second and third days instead of exhausting itself. The low of $2,408 held $48 above the September 15 swing low of $2,360, so the larger structure is not yet broken. And the bounce stalled precisely at the level that used to be support.

Eight Straight Days of ETF Outflows: $637 Million and Counting

U.S. spot Ether ETFs have now recorded net redemptions on eight consecutive trading days. Through Wednesday the seven-day total was $565 million. Thursday added $72.5 million. The running figure is above $637 million.

The daily detail shows the selling peaked midweek. Wednesday’s outflow was $160.9 million. The five sessions ending that day saw $506 million leave. Thursday’s $72.5 million is less than half of Wednesday’s, so the pace has slowed. It has not reversed.

Scale helps here. At an average price near $2,600 over the period, $637 million is equivalent to 245,000 ETH. BitMine, the single largest buyer in the market, added 87,216 ETH over the past 30 days. The funds have redeemed close to three times what the biggest corporate accumulator bought in a month, and they did it in eight sessions.

This is the second time in 2026 that the ETF channel has turned decisively negative. In May, the funds lost $540 million, their worst month of the year, as Ether traded down to $2,023. The current streak has already exceeded that total. November 2025 holds the record at $1.4 billion.

Ether’s ETF investor base is different from Bitcoin’s. Bitcoin funds have an anchor product, the iShares trust, that has taken in money through most drawdowns. Ether funds have no equivalent source of sticky demand. They are also structurally disadvantaged against holding the coin directly, because the U.S. products do not stake and so forgo a yield of 2.63% that on-chain holders collect. An allocator who wants Ether exposure without the yield is making a pure price bet, and pure price bets are sold when price falls.

The flow also arrived alongside a signal from the exchanges. Reserves of Ether held on trading venues spiked this week, which means coins are being moved from private wallets to places where they can be sold. Rising exchange balances and falling ETF holdings point the same direction.

One development offers a small offset. Thailand’s securities regulator has finalized its framework for Ether ETFs, with trading set to begin on October 16. New jurisdictions widen the buyer base over time. They do not replace $637 million of U.S. redemptions in a week.

For the price, the test is simple. Ether cannot hold $2,500 while the funds are net sellers every day. The first positive daily print would be the earliest sign that the pressure is lifting. Until it appears, rallies are running into supply from authorized participants working through redemptions.

BitMine at 4.93%: The Largest Buyer Has 89,536 ETH Left to Buy

The second lost buyer is more consequential over the longer run. BitMine holds 6,016,414 ETH as of October 4, worth $14.98 billion at the current price. That is 4.927% of the 122.1 million coins in circulation. The company has purchased Ether in every week since it began its treasury strategy on June 30, 2025. Its chairman said on October 7 that it will not acquire more than 5% of supply.

Five percent of 122.119 million is 6,105,950 ETH. BitMine is 89,536 ETH short of that, worth $223 million. At the 87,216 ETH it bought over the past 30 days, it reaches the cap within a month. At the 15,112 ETH it added in the most recent week, it gets there in six weeks.

Consider what that removes. In May the company was buying more than 100,000 ETH a week. It slowed to 26,659 a week that month and stretched its target to year-end. Even at the reduced pace, it has been the one participant in this market that bought regardless of price, through the May low at $2,023 and every dip since. That bid has a hard stop now, and the market knows where it is.

The company’s own stock explains part of the decision. BitMine trades at 0.91 times the market value of its net assets. When a treasury company trades below the value of what it holds, issuing new shares to buy more coins destroys value for existing holders. The financing mechanism that funded 15 months of purchases stops working at a discount. The company has authorized a $4 billion share repurchase instead.

What BitMine does keep doing is stake. It has 5,067,309 ETH staked, 84% of its holdings, producing a projected $363 million in annualized revenue at a seven-day yield of 2.63%. The stated goal is to stake the entire position. Those coins are locked away from the market, which is supportive for supply. The company is a holder that will not sell. It is no longer a buyer that will keep buying.

Across all listed companies, corporate treasuries hold 8,029,768 ETH, or 6.6% of supply. BitMine accounts for three-quarters of that. SharpLink (SBET) holds 868,699 ETH and The Ether Machine (ETHM) 496,712. Neither made purchases in the past 30 days. Bit Digital (BTBT) holds 158,461 ETH at a cost basis of $450.3 million, which works out to $2,842 a coin. Its position is underwater by $56 million.

The treasury trade was the story that carried Ether from its 2025 lows. It has matured. The buyers are full, their stocks trade at or below asset value, and the largest one has named its ceiling. What replaces that demand is the open question for the rest of 2026.

Derivatives: $43.9 Billion of Open Interest on a $304 Billion Asset

Ether’s derivatives market is large relative to the asset, and that ratio explains why its moves are sharper than Bitcoin’s. Perpetual futures open interest stands at $43.896 billion, which is 14.43% of market capitalization. Perpetual volume over the past 24 hours was 7.2 times spot volume. For every dollar of Ether that changed hands on a spot exchange, seven dollars traded in leveraged contracts.

In an asset where leverage is that dominant, price discovery happens in the futures market and liquidations do much of the work. Thursday’s $294.6 million of long liquidations against $57 million of shorts is a ratio of 5 to 1. The longs were the crowd, and the crowd was wrong.

The reset has done some good. The eight-hour funding rate on perpetuals is 0.0034%, which annualizes to 3.7%. That is low. Longs are paying very little to hold positions, which says the speculative excess that existed above $2,700 has been cleared. Markets rarely stage durable declines from flat funding, because there are few over-extended longs left to squeeze.

Against that, open interest remains high in absolute terms. At $43.9 billion it represents 17.6 million ETH of exposure. Two days of liquidations totaling several hundred million dollars barely dent a figure that size. And at least one large account that was liquidated on Thursday reopened sizable long positions within hours, which is the same behavior seen in Bitcoin this week: leverage being rebuilt on the way down.

Where the liquidation clusters sit now is the practical question. On October 7 there were $414.1 million of longs stacked near $2,700, and that pool was cleared between Wednesday and Thursday. Fresh longs opened in the $2,410 to $2,480 area on Thursday’s bounce have their liquidation levels below $2,360. A break of the September low would set off the next cascade.

On the other side, shorts opened during the slide from $2,700 are in profit and have stops trailing above the market. The $2,548 to $2,600 zone, where support used to be, is where those stops are likely concentrated. A push through $2,600 would force covering and could travel quickly to the $2,666 to $2,689 moving-average cluster.

The structure, then, is two-sided, with triggers at $2,360 below and $2,600 above. The difference is what stands behind each. Below $2,360 there is a liquidation pool and little spot demand. Above $2,600 there is a short squeeze into three moving averages and the area where ETF sellers and trapped longs are waiting.

Prediction contracts on October price levels price it accordingly: a 74.5% chance Ether trades $2,400 this month and 45.5% for $2,300, against 70.5% for $2,600 and 42.5% for $2,700. The odds are close to symmetrical. The quality of the support and resistance is not.

Technical Map: Below the 50-Day, With $2,355 as the Next Shelf

The daily chart turned bearish this week by the most common definition. Ether closed below its 50-day exponential moving average on Thursday for the first time since the September recovery began. That average sat at $2,500, the same level that marked horizontal support, and Friday’s high of $2,512.13 was a test of it from below that did not hold.

The next support is well defined. The 100-day exponential moving average converges with horizontal support at $2,355. The September 15 swing low is $2,360. A broader support band is drawn from $2,330 to $2,355. Three independent references inside a $30 range make this the most important zone on the chart. It is $134, or 5.4%, beneath spot.

How Ether got here matters for reading that level. From the September 15 low of $2,360 it rallied 18.9% to $2,805. It could not hold $2,800, consolidated between $2,630 and $2,774 for two weeks, and then gave back three-quarters of the entire recovery in three sessions. At Thursday’s low of $2,408, it had retraced 89% of the move. Retracements that deep usually go on to test the origin.

Resistance is stacked in three layers. The first is $2,500 to $2,512, the broken 50-day average and today’s high. The second is $2,548 to $2,600. The lower end of that band was the immediate support cited before the break, and $2,600 is the level that capped the early stage of September’s recovery. The third is $2,650 to $2,700, which holds the four-hour moving-average cluster at $2,666 to $2,689 and the bottom of the two-week range.

Beyond those, $2,774 is the October 2 high, $2,800 to $2,805 is the September peak, and $3,000 is the round number that a sustained break above $2,800 would bring into play.

Momentum has not yet reached the kind of extreme that marks a low. Thursday’s decline came on expanding volume and the bounce has come on contracting volume, with 24-hour turnover down 10.5% from the prior day. That is the profile of a pause.

The weekly candle will close on Sunday with a body of more than $200 and a small lower wick, the largest weekly decline since May. It engulfs the prior three weeks of price action.

For the bearish structure to be invalidated, Ether needs a daily close above $2,600. That would put it back above the 50-day average and the former support band, and would suggest Thursday was a liquidation flush that has been absorbed. A close above $2,700 would restore the range.

For it to be confirmed, a daily close below $2,355 is the signal. That opens $2,200, where prediction contracts price a 27.5% chance of a touch this month, and then the late-May low at $2,023.

ETH/BTC at 0.0300: Ether Is Losing the Relative Trade Again

One Ether buys 0.03002 Bitcoin. The ratio fell below 0.0300 briefly on Thursday, printing 0.02994. Ether has dropped 9.2% this week while Bitcoin lost 4.8%, so the ratio has shed roughly 4.5% in seven days.

The relative performance is a pattern, not a blip. Ether is 49.7% below its all-time high. Bitcoin is 34% below its own. Over twelve months Ether is down 42.7% and Bitcoin 31.8%. In each selloff this year Ether has fallen further, and in each recovery it has regained less.

Bitcoin’s share of total crypto market value is 57.9%. Ether’s is 10.52%. Total capitalization is $2.881 trillion. When risk is being reduced, capital consolidates into the largest and most liquid asset, and that has been Bitcoin throughout 2026.

There are reasons specific to Ether. Bitcoin has a single narrative, scarce digital collateral, and a deep ETF bid that returns after each drawdown. Ether’s investment case rests on network usage generating fees that accrue to holders through burning and staking. That case is harder to explain to an allocator and, as the fee data below show, harder to support with current numbers.

The competitive field has also widened. Solana trades at $109.47 and BNB at $739.07. A headline today notes that Stellar is outpacing Ethereum in tokenized-fund inflows amid a $4 billion surge in real-world-asset issuance. Ethereum still hosts the largest share of stablecoins and decentralized finance. It is no longer the automatic destination for every new on-chain product.

The cross rate is a useful timing tool. Durable Ether rallies in this cycle have begun with the ETH/BTC ratio turning up before the dollar price did. In May and June, when BitMine was buying 100,000 ETH a week, the ratio led. This week it is leading lower. As long as the ratio is falling, Ether rallies in dollar terms are a function of Bitcoin rising and are vulnerable the moment Bitcoin stalls.

Bitcoin itself is at $82,877, boxed between resting bids at $81,000 and a sell wall at $86,500, with its own spot ETFs having lost $728.9 million over Wednesday and Thursday. If Bitcoin breaks $81,000, Ether at a ratio of 0.0300 would be at $2,430 before any further relative weakness. If Bitcoin breaks $80,000, the same arithmetic gives $2,400, and the ratio would be unlikely to hold in that scenario.

A ratio back above 0.0310 would be the first sign that Ether-specific demand is returning. For now the pair is pointing the same way as the dollar chart.

Network Fundamentals: $957,082 in Daily Fees

The on-chain revenue picture is the weakest part of the Ether story and the one bulls spend the least time on. Over the past 24 hours the Ethereum network collected $957,082 in transaction fees. Of that, $495,978 counts as protocol revenue, the portion burned and removed from supply. Fees were up 13.0% on the day and revenue up 25.0%, a reflection of the liquidation-driven activity on Thursday.

Annualize those figures and the network is running at $349 million of fees and $181 million of burn. Set against a market value of $304.1 billion, Ether trades at 870 times annualized fees. Even allowing for a depressed day, that multiple describes an asset valued on something other than current cash generation.

The reason fees are so low is a design choice. Ethereum’s scaling roadmap moved most user activity to layer-2 networks that settle on the main chain in compressed batches. Transactions became cheap, which was the goal. The fees that used to accrue to Ether holders through the burn mechanism shrank with them. The base layer is busier than ever in terms of value secured and thinner than ever in revenue per unit of that value.

That trade-off has a monetary consequence. When fees were high, more Ether was burned than issued and supply fell. At current fee levels, issuance to validators exceeds the burn and supply is growing slowly. Circulating supply is 122.119 million, up from 120.7 million in May. The “ultrasound money” argument that supported the 2021 and 2024 rallies does not hold at $957,082 a day in fees.

Staking offers the offsetting yield. BitMine’s seven-day annualized staking return is 2.63%. For a holder who stakes, that is real income paid in Ether. Compare it with the alternatives. The 10-year Treasury yields 5.27%. The gap is 264 basis points in favor of the risk-free dollar asset, before accounting for Ether’s price volatility. In 2021, staking yields were higher than Treasury yields. The relationship has inverted, and it removes one of the reasons an institution would hold the coin.

The broader ecosystem contracted with the price. Decentralized finance capitalization fell to $82.9 billion from $85.8 billion in a day. Stablecoin supply held steady near $292 billion, and most of it still lives on Ethereum and its layer-2s, which is the network’s deepest moat. Samsung is adding USDC to its Galaxy wallet for up to 82 million devices, a distribution win for stablecoins that runs largely on Ethereum rails.

Usage is growing and the network is not in decline. The value capture for the token is what has weakened, and price follows value capture.

Security and Sentiment: An $86 Million Wallet Incident and Fear at 38

Two items outside price are weighing on the mood. Ledger, the hardware-wallet manufacturer, is investigating reports of drained wallets with estimated losses of $86 million and possible device tampering. Hardware wallets are the standard recommendation for self-custody. An incident of this size at the largest vendor, whatever the eventual cause, pushes cautious holders toward exchanges and custodians, and coins on exchanges are closer to being sold.

Separately, the Ethereum developer community has been debating contingency plans around the long-term vulnerability of its signature scheme to advances in computing. Proposals for emergency migration procedures drew public criticism from rival-chain founders this week. None of this is an immediate threat. It is the kind of headline that surfaces in weak markets and adds to the sense that Ether has more open questions than Bitcoin.

Sentiment readings have split. One widely followed gauge sits at 38, in the “fear” zone. Another eased from 64 to 59, still above neutral. The gap reflects methodology, with the lower reading weighted more heavily toward volatility and derivatives data and the higher toward social activity and momentum. A survey of retail users on one data platform shows 73% bullish on Ether today. Retail optimism at 73% during a week of 9.2% losses and $637 million in fund redemptions is not what capitulation looks like.

That matters for timing. Lows in this asset over the past two years have formed when sentiment was washed out across every measure, funding was negative and spot buyers were visibly absorbing supply. Today funding is slightly positive, one sentiment gauge is fearful and another is not, and the identifiable spot buyers are either full or redeeming.

There are a few constructive signals in the flow data. A co-founder of one of the largest mining pools swapped wrapped Bitcoin for Ether this week, a rotation trade by a sophisticated holder. Large on-chain wallets in Bitcoin have added more than 14,000 BTC since October 1, showing that size is willing to buy weakness in crypto generally. And Thailand’s ETF launch on October 16 opens a new market.

Regulation is moving in a supportive direction in the United States, with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s proposed digital-asset rules sparking a brief rally on Tuesday. In Europe, tighter stablecoin requirements under MiCA are changing liquidity conditions on euro-area venues.

None of these outweighs the central facts of the week. They do suggest that the eventual low will be bought, and that it will probably come at a level where sentiment and price agree, lower than where either is now.

Macro: A 5.27% Treasury Yield Against a 2.63% Staking Yield

Ether trades as a long-duration risk asset, and the rate environment is hostile to those. The 10-year Treasury yield is 5.27%, up 4 basis points today and near its highest level since 2002. The 30-year reached 5.618% this week. The Federal Reserve raised its target range to an upper bound of 4.00% in September, and futures put the probability of at least one more increase by December at 84.7%. Fed Governor Christopher Waller said on Thursday that additional hikes will likely be needed.

Higher yields hit Ether through three channels. They raise the discount rate applied to any asset valued on future adoption. They widen the gap between the 2.63% a staker earns and the 5.27% available in Treasuries. And they strengthen the dollar, with the dollar index at 102.3 earlier this week, close to an 18-month high.

Oil is the upstream cause. Brent is at $103.20 and West Texas Intermediate at $91.63, with WTI now positive on the day after opening 1.10% lower. Wednesday’s Ether break coincided with a spike in crude on Hormuz tanker attacks. Thursday’s bounce followed the president’s statement on Iran. Ether’s intraday correlation with oil, inverted, has been tight all week.

Risk appetite in equities is tentative. The Nasdaq Composite is up 0.40% at 27,301.61 after losing 1.3% on Thursday when a report put OpenAI’s revenue run rate $20 billion below earlier figures. The S&P 500 is up 0.34% at 7,791.71. Ether has historically tracked high-beta technology, and the software and AI-infrastructure names it correlates with fell 7% to 13% on Thursday and have not fully recovered.

Consumer data weakened today. The University of Michigan’s preliminary October sentiment index dropped to 46.3 from 48.1. Normally soft data would pull yields lower and help risk assets. The 10-year rose anyway, which says the bond market is trading inflation.

The asset that is benefiting from this backdrop is gold, up 0.89% at $4,181.84 with global gold-backed fund holdings at a record 4,256 tonnes. Capital seeking a hedge against inflation and fiscal strain is choosing metal. Ether has not been treated as a store of value in this cycle and is not being treated as one now.

A change would start in the Treasury market. Speculators are net short 900,615 contracts in 10-year futures. A soft inflation print would force covering, drop yields and lift every long-duration asset. Ether, with its higher beta and its cleared-out long positioning, would likely outperform Bitcoin on such a day.

That is the upside scenario and it depends on one release. The U.S. cash bond market is closed Monday for the federal holiday, so Ether trades through the weekend and Monday without a fresh signal from yields.

The Calendar: CPI on October 14, Thailand ETFs on October 16, Fed on October 28

The dates that will move Ether over the next three weeks are few and clearly marked.

Wednesday, October 14, brings the September consumer price index at 8:30 a.m. ET. Consensus is 3.6% year over year and 0.6% month over month. A reading below that lowers December Fed hike odds, pulls yields down and gives Ether its best chance to reclaim $2,600. A reading at consensus changes little and leaves ETF flows in charge. A reading above it pushes the 10-year toward 5.40% and puts $2,355 under direct pressure.

Friday, October 16, is the first day of trading for Ether ETFs in Thailand. Launch-day flows in new jurisdictions have been modest in the past. The event is more useful as a headline than as a source of demand.

Monday mornings matter for another reason. BitMine typically discloses its weekly holdings at the start of the week. The next update will show how many of its remaining 89,536 ETH it bought into this decline. A large purchase would bring the cap closer. A small one would confirm the company is conserving capacity. Either way the market learns how much dry powder is left, and the answer is not much.

The daily ETF flow figure, published each evening, is the most important recurring data point. Eight negative days in a row is the current count. A ninth and tenth would take the streak past anything seen since the November 2025 record month.

October 27 to 28 is the Federal Open Market Committee meeting. A hold is priced at better than 80%. The statement and press conference will shape December expectations.

November 3 is the U.S. midterm election and the expiry of the president’s Iran pledge.

On the network side, there is no scheduled upgrade inside this window to act as a catalyst. The roadmap items that excite developers, higher throughput and faster finality, are 2027 events.

The weekend carries its own risk. Liquidity is thin, the first anniversary of the October 10, 2025 liquidation cascade is tomorrow, and Ether’s perpetual market at 7.2 times spot volume is exactly the venue where weekend moves get exaggerated. A push through $2,512 on Saturday would trigger some short covering toward $2,548. A slip under $2,409 would set off stops toward $2,360. Neither should be given much weight until the Monday ETF number and Wednesday’s inflation data confirm or reject it.

For those trading the levels, the sequence to watch is ETF flow turning positive, then the ETH/BTC ratio holding 0.0300, then a daily close above $2,600. All three in order would mark a low. None has happened yet.

Forecast and Verdict: Sell Rallies Below $2,600, With $2,355 the First Target

The bull case for Ether at $2,489 has real components. Funding has reset to 0.0034% per eight hours, so leverage is no longer stretched on the long side. The price is 49.7% below its record, which leaves room. Stablecoin supply of $292 billion sits largely on its rails. BitMine’s 5.07 million staked coins are locked. Regulatory direction in the United States is favorable. A crowded Treasury short could unwind on soft inflation data and lift everything.

The bear case is more immediate. ETFs have redeemed $637 million in eight days and exchange reserves are rising. The largest buyer in the market has 89,536 ETH left before it stops, and its stock trades at 0.91 times asset value. The 50-day average and $2,500 support are broken. Network fees are $957,082 a day. The staking yield of 2.63% is half the 10-year Treasury yield. The ETH/BTC ratio is at 0.0300 and falling. Open interest is still $43.9 billion.

The second list describes what is happening now. The first describes what could happen later. Price follows flows, and the flows are negative.

The base case for the coming week is a range of $2,355 to $2,600, with the lower half more likely than the upper. A test of the $2,330 to $2,360 zone is the central expectation, either before or on the inflation release. That zone combines the 100-day moving average, the September 15 low and a horizontal shelf, and it is where a first serious attempt to buy would be justified.

The bearish extension is a daily close under $2,355. That breaks the September low, triggers the liquidation pool beneath it and targets $2,200. Below $2,200 the chart points at $2,023, the level reached on May 30.

The bullish alternative needs a daily close above $2,600 and a positive ETF flow print. Targets from there are $2,666 to $2,689, then $2,774 and $2,805. A break of $2,805 would open $3,000. That path requires yields to fall and Bitcoin to clear $84,000, and neither is in hand.

On rating, Ether at $2,489.10 is a sell on rallies. The entry that makes sense is $2,548 to $2,600, with a stop on a daily close above $2,610 and a first target of $2,355. From $2,575 that risks $35 to make $220. Selling at $2,489, $80 off the low, is a poor location. For long-term holders, the level to defend is $2,330 on a weekly closing basis. For buyers, $2,330 to $2,360 is the zone to watch, and only with evidence that ETF outflows have stopped.

The stance is bearish near term and neutral beyond it. Ether lost its ETF bid and its treasury bid in the same week, and at $2,489 it is testing the underside of the floor it stood on a month ago.

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