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ETH Shatters $4,900 Barrier as Analyst Declares: ’BTC Is Exhausted, ETH Isn’t’ in Crypto Market Summary

ETH Shatters $4,900 Barrier as Analyst Declares: ’BTC Is Exhausted, ETH Isn’t’ in Crypto Market Summary

Author:
CoindeskEN
Published:
2025-08-24 19:36:58
19
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Ethereum rockets past $4,900 while Bitcoin shows signs of fatigue—setting up a dramatic power shift in digital assets.

The Great Rotation

Money's flooding out of tired Bitcoin positions and into Ethereum's blazing momentum. Traders aren't just diversifying—they're outright pivoting.

Technical Exhaustion vs. Momentum

BTC's chart patterns scream overextension while ETH breaks structure after structure. This isn't correction territory—it's full-scale regime change.

Institutional Flows Tell the Story

Smart money already positioned for this flip weeks ago. The retail crowd? Still staring at Bitcoin's legacy price points like they matter.

Wall Street's finally noticing what crypto natives knew months ago—sometimes the second mouse gets the cheese while the first one hits the trap.

Five-year ETH-USD chart on Coinbase showing a decisive break above the Nov. 2021 all-time high into price discovery

The 5-day view fills in the tape action. After a fast run from the mid-$4,700s, ETH pushed through $4,900 and reached an intraday high around $4,946.90. At the time of the chart snapshot — 6:48 p.m. UTC — the last price was about $4,941.57. That sequence signals buyers absorbed supply NEAR the old ceiling and then forced a fresh high, a classic breakout pattern.

ETH-USD 5-Day Chart From TradingView showing a breakout above $4,900 with a new intraday high near $4,946.90 on Aug. 24, 2025

Analyst Miles Deutsher summed up the leadership shift as “BTC is exhausted, ETH isn’t.” In plain English, he is flagging relative momentum: bitcoin’s rallies have stalled near recent highs while ether just broke into price discovery.

When a market says one asset is “exhausted,” it usually means upside attempts are fading, follow-through is weak, and sellers keep meeting pushes higher; “isn’t” means the opposite — stronger follow-through, fresh highs, and active dip-buying. Traders often rotate toward the asset showing higher relative strength when the other leader tires.

Crypto Rover focused on supply on exchanges. “Exchange reserves” refers to coins held in wallets controlled by centralized trading venues.

When those balances trend down, fewer coins are immediately available to sell. If demand rises as liquid supply thins, price can accelerate because buyers must bid higher to coax coins off-exchange back into circulation. That is the mechanic behind his “supply shock” phrasing — not a guarantee of straight-up prices, but a setup where scarcity can magnify moves once momentum starts.

Michaël van de Poppe offered a risk check. He highlighted the unusually large weekly candle and cautioned that weekend breakouts often retrace when liquidity normalizes early in the week.

The idea is simple: weekend order books can be thinner, so moves extend more easily; when fuller participation returns on Monday, prices sometimes retest the breakout area to confirm it as support before trending again. In practice, that means a pullback toward the breakout zone WOULD not, by itself, negate the larger bullish break you see on the 5-year chart.

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