#以太坊的未来 Recently, the cryptocurrency market has been quite lively, and many people are paying attention to the trends of Ethereum. Today, let's talk about it.
First, let's take a look at the recent price fluctuations of Ethereum. Recently, the price of Ethereum has been oscillating between $1688 - $1750. On April 23, it broke through $1750, but in the short term, we should focus on the support level at $1688. If it can hold, it might be able to rise further, testing $1830 (the upper band of the weekly Bollinger Bands) and $1930 (the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement level). However, on April 25, there is a $1700 put option expiration, and the bears might come out to stir things up, so we can expect some significant price fluctuations. From a technical indicator perspective, the MACD has formed a golden cross, and a red three soldiers pattern has appeared, which is a signal of a bullish trend. However, the RSI has entered the overbought zone, and the KDJ has formed a death cross, indicating a potential correction, and the contest between bulls and bears is quite fierce.
Now, let's talk about the Pectra upgrade that started on April 25; this is a key variable in the short term. This upgrade introduces EIP-7732 (account abstraction optimization) and Layer2 expansion plans. If successfully implemented, transaction costs could drop below $0.001, with TPS potentially increasing to 20,000 transactions per second, which would be very beneficial for the ecological development of Ethereum and could also stimulate further growth in DeFi's total locked value (TVL), which is currently at $46.7 billion. However, the sharding technology has been delayed due to compatibility issues with ZK-Rollup, and the current mainnet TPS is still in the range of 15-45, which is a bit insufficient in high-frequency trading scenarios.
From a medium-term perspective, there are two important driving factors. First, there are expectations of interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve. Trump has been pressuring the Federal Reserve, and the market's prediction of a rate cut in June has jumped from 32.8% to 61.8%. The dollar index has also fallen to a new low of 98.2790 this year. This has led to funds beginning to flow into risk assets. If the interest rate is actually cut, the expected return on Ethereum could rise from 12% to 18%, potentially attracting around $2 billion in allocation funds. Second, there are expectations of institutional funds and ETFs. Institutions like BlackRock are liquidating 47% of RWA tokenized fund assets through Ethereum, indicating that traditional finance still recognizes Ethereum relatively well. However, the SEC has prohibited ETH ETFs from participating in staking, resulting in a 22% year-on-year decrease in institutional fund inflows, while Bitcoin ETFs attracted $30 billion during the same period, causing the ETH/BTC exchange rate to drop to a historical low of 0.0193. If staking approval is granted, it could bring in $800 million to $1.2 billion in inflows in the first week.
From a long-term perspective, Ethereum faces several challenges. In terms of public chain competition, Solana is developing quite well, achieving a TPS of 9000 and transaction costs as low as $0.0001, capturing 38% of the public chain market share, with 2 million daily active users, while Ethereum's mainnet only has 360,000. Moreover, the DeFi and NFT markets are also declining, with Ethereum's on-chain NFT sales down 90% compared to their peak, further weakening the demand for ETH. Additionally, although Ethereum has burned $7.3 billion worth of ETH in the past four years, its annual inflation rate is still 0.805%, with the issuance exceeding the amount burned. Staking yields are only 3.2%, significantly lower than the Federal Reserve's benchmark interest rate (5.25%), the number of validating nodes is decreasing, and the staking rate has dropped to 27%, making it less attractive.
Let's take a look at the entire cryptocurrency environment; it is currently a mix of bullish and bearish sentiments. On the macro level, with the dollar weakening and geopolitical risks easing, such as the cooling of China-U.S. tariffs, this supports everyone's risk appetite. However, the SEC's classification of 75% of ERC-20 tokens as securities for regulation has a certain inhibiting effect on innovation in the cryptocurrency space. In terms of technological upgrades, Ethereum's technical routes, such as sharding and Layer2, are the core of its long-term value, but in the short term, it faces competition from 'Ethereum killers' like Solana and the 'vampire effect' of Layer2 on the mainnet. There are also liquidity risks, such as during holidays like Good Friday, when trading volume may suddenly drop, increasing volatility, as Bitcoin has previously experienced single-day fluctuations exceeding $3000.
Overall, Ethereum is supported in the short term by the Pectra upgrade and expectations of interest rate cuts, showing potential for an increase, but we must also be cautious of the technology not landing as expected and possible bear counterattacks. In the medium term, it depends on whether ETF funds can flow in significantly and the macroeconomic shift. In the long term, it relies on ecological recovery and technological breakthroughs. The current environment in the cryptocurrency space is quite complex, with macro policies playing a dominant role, technological upgrades showing differentiation, and regulatory suppression also in place. Investors in this volatile market need to balance risks and opportunities, focusing on whether the ETH/BTC exchange rate can break through the 0.03 strong-weak dividing line.
