Ethereum Plummets in 2025—Wipes Out Entire 2024 Rally Overnight
Ethereum’s brutal 2025 correction shocks crypto markets as prices collapse below 2023 levels—erasing all gains from last year’s bull run in a single red candle.
What triggered the crash? Speculation points to leveraged longs getting liquidated after failed ETF inflows, with some blaming Ethereum’s own scaling delays for pushing traders toward faster chains. Classic case of ’buy the rumor, sell the news’—except this time Wall Street didn’t even show up for the party.
Now the question remains: Is this a healthy reset for ETH’s overextended valuation, or just another reminder that in crypto, ’number go up’ isn’t a business model?
The crypto market took a hit in early 2025 in contrast to the late 2024 highs it achieved. The total crypto market cap dropped over 18% in Q1 falling to $2.8 trillion at the close of Q1, after it briefly touched $3.8 trillion high in January.
Even with the market slump, Bitcoin’s dominance surged to 59.1%, which is its highest since 2021.
Ethereum Struggles Dropping 45% in Q1
Ethereum fell by a sharp 3.9 percentage points, falling to just 7.9% in market dominance. This marks Ether’s lowest share since late 2019 which shows its sluggish performance amidst the broader market.
Ethereum plummeted 45.3% in Q1 2025, closing at $1,805, wiping out all its 2024 gains. It massively underperformed cryptos like Bitcoin, Solana, XRP, and Binance Coin, which recorded minimun declines. Its trading volume also dropped from $30 billion in Q4 2024 to $24.4 billion in the latest quarter.
Whale Activity Worsens the Drop
Additionally, recent data from lookonchain reveals that a wallet linked to the Ethereum Foundation deposited 1,000 $ETH worth $1.58M to Kraken, which could trigger a drop in price.
Ethereum Foundation (EF) faced criticism in 2024 for offloading 4,466 ETH worth $12.61 million during bearish market conditions. These sales have historically been followed by sharp price drops, adding more pressure to already lagging Ether.
Veteran trader Peter Brandt also recently warned that Ether could crash to $800, revisiting its 2022 lows. ETH is now 70% below its 2021 peak of $4,878, with most of the losses in just the last three months. The token is currently trading at $1,757, down over 2% today.
