Ethereum drops below $3,000: a dual dilemma of lagging technological innovation and dispersed ecological benefits

Source: BlockMedia Original Title: Ethereum, 5% Drop Breaks $3000 Support… What the Price Decline Means Original Link:

Ethereum Breaks Psychological Barrier

Ethereum(ETH) price drops below the psychological support line of $3000. Recently, as the gap in profitability and activity between competing blockchains becomes more apparent, internal concerns about delays in technological innovation have intensified. Although the Ethereum Foundation has released a roadmap for performance improvements as a response, the market is simultaneously paying attention to short-term price trends and the potential for medium- to long-term structural shifts.

According to CoinMarketCap data, Ethereum has fallen more than 5% in 24 hours, with the current trading price at $2,928. It was trading around $3,100 the day before, but early this morning, the decline accelerated, breaking through the $3,000 support line.

Concerns Over Weakening Structural Competitiveness

Market analysis suggests that Ethereum’s weak price performance is not only a short-term supply and demand issue but also compounded by concerns over diminishing structural competitiveness. In fact, recently, alternative platforms like Solana and TRON have shown strong performance in activity and profitability metrics.

Both profitability and trading volume lag behind

According to data from blockchain analytics firm Nansen, the annualized yield on the Ethereum network has decreased by approximately 76% year-over-year, down to $604 million. This decline is attributed to reduced Layer 2 fees resulting from upgrades like “Dencun” and “Fusaka.”

Meanwhile, Solana achieved $657 million in revenue, and TRON reached $601 million, both surpassing Ethereum. In the Artemis metric, which reflects actual user activity, using 2025 as a baseline, Solana’s monthly active users reached 98 million, with a total transaction volume of 34 billion, leading in most high-frequency domains.

Nansen CEO Alex Svanevik pointed out: “Although the total value locked(TVL) on Ethereum remains ahead, this alone is difficult to explain the ecosystem’s advantages. Overconfidence driven by data is weakening the internal urgency of Ethereum.”

The economic density advantage remains, but yield connectivity wanes

Some experts believe that Ethereum functions as a “final settlement infrastructure,” where the economic value of individual transactions exceeds simple transaction volume. In contrast, a significant portion of Solana’s traffic is composed of automated trading bots and consensus messages, making its activity volume relatively less economically effective.

However, the issue is that Layer 2-based scaling strategies are actually weakening ETH’s value accumulation and yield connectivity. While reducing fees, in a decentralized ecosystem, the economic benefits gained by the main chain are continually decreasing.

Seeking Reversal with “Beam Chain,” but Success Is Uncertain

This year, the Ethereum Foundation accelerated its strategic shift towards a technical core. Key technical developers like Tomasi Steinczak(Nethermind founder), Wang Xiaoway, and others have gained core decision-making power, with performance optimization becoming a primary focus.

Particularly, the new roadmap called “Beam Chain” centers on a revolutionary improvement in the main chain’s processing speed through 4-second slot times and single-slot finality(single-slot finality). This strategy is a direct competitor to high-speed integrated blockchains like Solana, but large-scale network upgrades also carry high technical risks.

Implications of Price Drop

Market analysis suggests that Ethereum’s sharp decline is not only a supply-demand adjustment but also reflects a loss of investor confidence in technological and ecological transformation. While Ethereum is still recognized as a core infrastructure for global digital finance, doubts about the “profit dispersion” within its ecosystem and the speed of technological development are currently weakening investment appeal in the short term.

Nansen stated: “Ethereum’s survival strategy is not dependent on past metrics(TVL) but on whether it can rapidly achieve substantive technological innovation and ecosystem integration. The market will observe whether Ethereum maintains its ‘infrastructure’ status or regains dominance.”