From early institutions reducing their holdings at high levels, to core advocates clearing their positions and leaving, and to foundations leaving in large numbers, Ethereum is gradually shedding its former glory as the "king of public chains". The current market generally believes that the development trajectory of Ethereum is highly similar to that of Chinese concept stocks that have gone global in the past: relying on overseas capital to start, relying on external market pricing, and falling into a stalemate of positioning swings, weak narrative, and unclear rights and responsibilities. The concept of "ETH is Money" that once resounded throughout the industry is gradually losing its effectiveness, and community confidence continues to loosen. Ethereum has already stood at a crossroads of development.

1、 Iconic figures have left one after another, shaking the foundation of their faith

Reviewing recent market trends, two key large-scale reductions have become clear signals of Ethereum's cooling sentiment. As early as 2023, early Ethereum investment firm Wanxiang sold its ETH in batches, with an average transaction price of approximately $2047; By May 2026, Bankless, as the core promotional platform for Ethereum, and its founder Hoffman have also chosen to clear all ETH holdings, with the transaction price remaining at around $2000.

Bankless was once the core driving force behind the classic narrative of "ETH is Money". In the 2021 bull market, this concept ignited a frenzy for Ethereum in the entire market and convinced many investors of the long-term value of ETH. Now the stance of the core evangelists has reversed, coupled with the departure of eight core members of the Ethereum Foundation in just a few months, and doubts about the future of the project have completely erupted from the outside world.

Faced with the public opinion storm, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik released a long article in response. He admitted that the Ethereum Foundation only holds 0.16% of the total ETH circulation on the network and should not have surpassed other nodes in the ecosystem. At the same time, he stated that he will gradually withdraw from daily operations and return Ethereum to a "decentralized and free ecosystem". This statement did not calm market sentiment, but instead triggered more thinking: the fundamentals of the Ethereum ecosystem are still stable, and the industry's dominance has not declined, but dissatisfaction is spreading everywhere. Is the problem really only in the performance of the coin price?

Comparing with the current mainstream public chains, it is not difficult to find that different projects have completely different market logics when facing market fluctuations. Bitcoin is falling, and the first reaction of funds is to buy at low prices; Solana, which experienced the FTX storm, achieved a strong rebound through ecological reconstruction and its value has been repeatedly verified by the market; HYPE, with its track characteristics, has become a favored target for trading players. On the other hand, Ethereum is no longer simply defined by "short-term fluctuations" in the market, and the trust crisis has permeated multiple levels such as community, governance, and development direction.

Many founding teams and foundations of public blockchain projects have controversial styles of action: Solana founders actively embrace popular tracks to expand the ecosystem, multiple Ripple founders have also significantly reduced their holdings of XRP, and a group of emerging Layer2 project teams have a distinct style. In contrast, although Vitalik and the Ethereum Foundation have been criticized for their idealistic behavior and internal operational efficiency, they are not the direct culprits behind the current predicament. Fundamentally, the dilemma of Ethereum is the concentrated outbreak of long-term contradictions between the overall development environment and ecological structure.

2、 Benchmarking Chinese concept stocks: Same origin development architecture, similar fate dilemma

The current Ethereum has many features that highly overlap with Chinese concept stocks that were once listed on the US stock market. Chinese concept stocks generally adopt offshore structures, rely on US dollar fund investments, and complete capitalization by listing on US stocks, forming a development model of "overseas concept packaging+local market landing". This model has also created a wealth myth that lasted for twenty years. The growth path of Ethereum also bears a similar imprint.

Looking back at the early stages of Ethereum's development, from 2014 to 2015, Vitalik received strong support from Wanxiang Group led by Shen Bo and Xiao Feng, and successfully obtained a start-up capital of $500000. Different from Bitcoin's pure mining and distribution model, Ethereum attracts participants through multiple modes such as ICO fundraising, PoW mining, and PoS staking, and has strong institutional attributes since its inception.

This architecture is destined to prevent the Ethereum ecosystem from achieving absolute equal decentralization, and the phenomenon of "feudal separatism" among major powers has become the norm. Under such a system, the foundation and core founders should have played a role in coordinating direction, building consensus, and constraining the disorderly development of the ecosystem. However, the Ethereum Foundation has undergone several evolutions, from its early development philosophy to the subsequent "ladder theory", and its governance ideas have become increasingly abstract and hollow, making it difficult for ordinary coin holders and developers to understand. In the rsETH related controversy, the founder of Aave has instead become the leader of the ecological order; When Solana Foundation took the initiative to cross over and collaborate with the industry ecosystem, Ethereum Foundation continued to act independently, with team reductions and core figures remaining silent becoming the norm.

The governance posture of excessive restraint has gradually evolved into another form of governance irresponsibility. Deliberately weakening its own influence and actively reducing the size of the foundation is not the optimal solution for Ethereum at present. What the industry expects more is that the core team can delegate power to pragmatic operational forces, face ecological reality issues, and provide direction for the development of Ethereum.

Except for Bitcoin, all public chains must face hard assessment indicators such as ecological activity, landing applications, and user growth. The current enthusiasm for the Ethereum DeFi ecosystem in the market is more a memory of past glory, rather than the current reality of continuous wealth creation. When it comes to external competition, Solana will feel anxious about the impact of emerging tracks, while Ethereum, with its size advantage, has no external competitors that can truly shake its position; Its crisis has never been external, but internal - who is responsible for the ETH price? Who will lead the ecological progress? These two core questions have not been answered yet. Vitalik is now shifting its focus to the privacy track, but while focusing on a single direction, it should not avoid the market's reasonable demands for asset value and ecological commercialization.

3、 Narrative transition between old and new, PoS system in awkward deadlock

With the landing of ETH pledged ETFs and the establishment of self built pledge services by institutions such as BitMine, mainstream liquidity pledge service providers such as Lido are fully committed to creating a "productive asset" narrative, and Ethereum has entered a new stage of value reassessment. But embarrassment followed: the ETH price has been hovering around $2000 for a long time, the marginal returns of top platforms such as Lido continuing to expand continue to decrease, the annualized yield of pledging across the entire network is under significant pressure, and the narrative of "productive currency" is beginning to show signs of fatigue.

The entire PoS ecosystem has fallen into a vicious cycle of no one taking responsibility: foundations do not intervene in price trends, pledge service providers are unable to leverage market trends, and the vast Ethereum system is stuck at a point of stagnant value. This situation is similar to the current situation of Chinese concept stocks. Chinese concept stocks, which used to rely on the US stock market for capitalization, have adjusted their narrative logic and turned to new tracks such as AI, high-end manufacturing, and robotics to seek transformation after changes in the external environment, but they have always been unable to return to their former peak. Ethereum is no exception, with the old narrative fading and the new narrative still waiting to be seen.

Currently, Ethereum has identified three core technological directions: privacy solutions centered around ZK technology, on chain AI and end-to-end small models, and a return to the underlying L1 ecosystem. In addition, stablecoins, RWA real asset tokenization and other tracks continue to be laid out. The grand vision of a "world computer" has now degenerated into "finding application scenarios in the existing world", completely reversing the subject and object. The spirit of blockchain disrupting tradition no longer exists, and projects oscillate and struggle in multiple directions, causing market sentiment to become contradictory.

Objectively speaking, after more than a decade of development, although Ethereum has not fully realized its initial concept of a "world computer", it has become the most open experimental blockchain in the world, where various innovative ideas and project models can be tested and implemented. On a conceptual level, Vitalik has always insisted that ETH is a functional digital commodity, which is in stark contrast to Bankless's promotion of 'ETH as currency'. From a behavioral perspective, he also sold 8800 ETH in batches through CowSwap, acting relatively restrained and not engaging in aggressive cash out or speculative activities.

But looking at the entire encryption industry, the trend has already shifted towards the AI track. Numerous native encryption projects quickly switch tracks: Hermes Agent attracts mainstream AI developers' attention, xUbble integrates AI and on chain intent framework, OpenSea founder enters AI infrastructure... These projects are well versed in market operation logic and deeply bind blockchain with AI, traffic, and financial services. On the other hand, Ethereum, although some teams such as dAI have launched the ERC-8183 standard and attempted to build an on chain AI agent economic framework, has mostly passively adapted to industry trends, completely losing its former leading position in the industry.

Let's imagine an extreme scenario: if mainstream AI giants develop their own public chains, how will Ethereum handle itself? Relying on the PoS mechanism, the threshold for asset migration is not high, but the compliance practices accumulated over the years and the inclusive and open financial experimental environment remain the unique core barriers of Ethereum. Just as the global market is increasingly fragmented, companies from different fields will compete and balance each other. With its borderless and open nature, Ethereum can still play the role of a global linker.

4、 Final Reflection: The Golden Age has come to an end, and a new journey urgently needs to establish its direction

It cannot be denied that the golden age of Ethereum has completely disappeared. The reduction of holdings by Wanxiang, foundations, and various early institutions will not stop, and the price of the currency will also be difficult to replicate the previous skyrocketing trend. But at a price of $2000, which is still ten times the historical low, Ethereum is not heading towards decline, but has entered a new stage of development.

From the perspective of underlying logic, the fate of Ethereum and Chinese concept stocks is highly similar: relying on overseas ideas and capital to start, relying on overseas markets to complete pricing, only undertaking application and circulation functions locally, and falling into a transformation dilemma together after the global landscape changes. But there are also opportunities in the crisis. The fragmentation of the global market has given rise to new demands. Cross regional connections, free financial experimentation, and open innovation soil are still irreplaceable values of Ethereum.

Today's Ethereum is not lacking in technological accumulation, ecological scale, users, and developers. What is truly lacking is a clear development direction, a unified value narrative, and a governance force that dares to take responsibility. After shedding its halo, Ethereum no longer needs to cling to the past frenzy, but needs to face reality, gather consensus, and prioritize privacy AI、RWA、 Find your own positioning in native L1 and other tracks.

The past glory has become a memory, and Ethereum no longer needs to be a highly sought after "super asset", but still has the opportunity to become the most stable infrastructure in the global Web3 world. The key to overcoming the predicament in the future lies not in confronting external competition, but in breaking the internal governance deadlock and redefining the direction for this giant ship to move forward.