Ethereum holders return to profit – Can ETH hold $2500?

The price of Ethereum [ETH] was changing hands at $2,508.45 after a hike of 4.1% in the past 24 hours.

This was expected to steal the spotlight, as this largest altcoin has struggled a lot since February 2026 to reclaim above the resistance level at $2500. However, except for bearish pressure and consolidation phases, ETH didn’t see a major bullish push.

Usually in such scenarios, the RSI reaches the overbought territory. Though ETH did reach that zone, now it’s slowly coming down to the 60-70 RSI range, suggesting strong bullish momentum.

Ethereum recovered from unrealized loss

Adding more weight to the ongoing sentiment, Ethereum’s MVRV (Market Value to Realized Value), which shows whether Ethereum holders, on average, are sitting on an unrealized profit or loss, is also positive.

In fact, according to CryptoQuant’s data, Ethereum’s MVRV had remained below 1.00 for 200 consecutive days. However, the situation changed on the 21st of August, 2026, when Ethereum’s MVRV moved back above 1.00 for the first time in those 200 days.

This was when ETH had recovered above its reported realized price of around $2,300. However, crossing above MVRV 1.00 is not automatically a guarantee that ETH will continue rising. In fact, the realized-price area can initially create selling pressure.

Therefore, it’s important for ETH to maintain its price above the $2,300 realized-price level. This is because someone who bought ETH at $4,000 would still be underwater at $2,404, while someone who bought at $1,500 would be significantly profitable.

Bearish momentum has not vanished

This comes as a huge Ethereum whale appears to have sold its entire 167,855 ETH position—worth roughly $408 million at the reported prices—over a period of about five days. According to Lookonchain data, the wallet first received the 167,855 ETH from multiple addresses and then began sending the coins to exchanges such as OKX, Binance, and Bybit.

In the reported transactions, around 70,739 ETH worth approximately $174 million had already been deposited, while roughly 97,115 ETH worth about $237 million remained in the wallet at the time of reporting. Now this is expected to add some selling pressure on the ETH price action.

This further coincided with the Coldcard-linked hacker beginning to swap stolen Bitcoin for Ether through THORChain, moving about 10% of the stolen funds while 90% remains untouched.

However, with Spot Ethereum ETFs recording monthly inflows worth $365.17 million in July, $1.85 billion in August, and $104.26 million in September to date, hope remains.

But with AMBCrypto recently reporting that ETH’s price stalled near $2,458, bulls have not yet established $2,500 as solid support.

Final Summary

• Ethereum’s MVRV breaks above 1.00 after 2002 days when the ETH price reached $2300.
• However, the whale movement has added selling pressure on the altcoin.