Ethereum Faces Challenges at $2500: Macro Pressures and On-Chain Weakness Persist

While Ethereum remains a central pillar of the decentralized finance (DeFi News) ecosystem, its path towards $2500 is facing multiple headwinds. Currently, heightened macro market uncertainty, tightening global liquidity, and geopolitical risks are suppressing risk asset sentiment, causing the ETH price to retreat from recent highs of around $2200. Although on-chain activity indicators show short-term weakness, with DEX trading volume and DApp revenue growth slowing, Ethereum's dominance in total value locked (TVL) remains solid, demonstrating strong capital attraction.

Notably, when Layer 2 scaling solutions are included in the statistics, the Ethereum ecosystem still accounts for the vast majority of the total market TVL, indicating that institutional and professional investors have not withdrawn due to short-term volatility. Compared to other blockchain networks claiming lower fees or higher throughput, traditional financial participants value Ethereum's long-term security, decentralized governance, and ecosystem maturity more. This structural preference constitutes a key support for its resistance to short-term downward pressure.

Looking ahead, whether ETH can break through resistance levels will highly depend on improvements in the macro environment. If the Federal Reserve's policy turns dovish, market risk appetite rebounds, and institutional demand for DeFi News infrastructure allocation increases, ETH is expected to regain upward momentum. Conversely, if inflation recurs and volatility soars, even if Ethereum's fundamentals are sound, the price may continue to be under pressure. Investors need to focus on macro data, on-chain fund flows, and the usage growth of L2 protocols, which will be the core indicators for judging the next stage of the trend.