In the performance of the crypto market over the past year, Ethereum has appeared relatively weak compared to Bitcoin and other public chain coins, including those like Solana and Sui. The latest data shows that Sui leads with an astonishing increase of 434.1%, while Solana also achieved a growth of 84.2%, far surpassing ETH, which has left Ethereum supporters and holders feeling relatively downcast recently.
Trump's administration may bring favorable policies, injecting new growth momentum into ETH.
Regulatory environment changes rejuvenate legitimate crypto projects.
Trump announced that his nominated former SEC commissioner Paul Atkins will serve as the next SEC chairman. This change could fundamentally alter the regulatory environment, as the SEC, previously led by Gary Gensler, took a hardline approach against DeFi projects, including investigating major projects like Uniswap, which limited the development of the Ethereum ecosystem.
Moreover, the new administration may gradually phase out the past 'VC coins are worthless' theory, as under the previous regulatory environment, many venture capital firms' investments in blockchain infrastructure and innovative projects were often undervalued, while the market was once keen to hype speculative assets lacking practicality, like meme coins.
Trump's crypto-friendly stance and potentially more favorable SEC policies will change this phenomenon. Legitimate projects no longer need to worry about receiving continuous Wells notices from the SEC and will instead receive more support from regulatory agencies.
Staking reward ETFs may become a new engine for funds flowing into Ethereum.
On the other hand, under Trump’s new administration, the SEC may approve more ETF applications for Ethereum, especially ETFs that allow staking rewards. This move could not only bring higher fund inflows to Ethereum but also enhance its attractiveness as an asset, with staking rewards potentially rising to 4%-5%. In the context of the Federal Reserve lowering interest rates, such yields will be more attractive to institutional investors.
Trump family's investment provides soft endorsement.
Additionally, the decentralized finance project 'World Liberty Financial' launched by the Trump family has already invested a significant amount of capital within the Ethereum ecosystem, purchasing core assets like ETH, Chainlink, and Aave, ONDO, etc. This action is not only one of the biggest 'soft' endorsements for the Ethereum ecosystem but will also stimulate more capital to pay attention to the future development of this blockchain network.
AI intelligence, a series of important network upgrades, and improvements in the U.S. regulatory environment are all reasons to look forward to Ethereum in 2025.
As of now, ETH (Ether) has risen 53.5% this year, from $2,350 on January 1 to the current $3,400.
The longer it is suppressed, the stronger the rebound will be.
Ethereum will welcome the Pectra upgrade in 2025.
One of the eagerly anticipated major upgrades is the Pectra upgrade—this is the next important milestone on Ethereum's roadmap, expected to be launched in early 2025. The Pectra upgrade will fundamentally change the way Ethereum's security layer operates.
Currently, Ethereum staking mainly relies on liquidity. Essentially, many ETH holders wish to participate in staking. This is usually a good thing, as more nodes mean more decentralization and higher security.
However, Ethereum has now reached a massive scale—communication among over 1 million Ethereum validators—which is starting to slow down the network.
Pectra addresses this issue by increasing the maximum effective balance of validators from 32 ETH to 2,048 ETH, significantly reducing the number of required validators and alleviating pressure on the network.
Reduced pressure means faster networks, and the experience for Ethereum users will improve.
This will make staking cheaper, leading to more people participating in staking, which will gradually reduce staking rewards over time. For this reason, we hold a very optimistic attitude towards restaking. Many people will hope to increase their staking rewards by securing other networks.
In the past two weeks, the net inflow of Ethereum ETFs reached $1.5 billion, becoming one of the periods with the highest inflow among eight spot funds.
And the net inflow of Ethereum's current ETFs exceeded $2.1 billion in December, setting a new record, almost double the inflow in November.
Funds are flowing in, but the price hasn't risen much yet. Once the upward trend opens up, the potential is unimaginable.
