The president of ETF Store, Nate Geraci, recently drew widespread attention from investors and institutions with updates on the Ethereum spot ETF (Exchange-Traded Fund). According to his post on X, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) may approve the launch of these products by July 2, but has postponed the decision until mid-July.
Following Geraci’s update, there was a large-scale sell-off of Ethereum-based tokens.
Whale dumps LDO, AAVE, and UNI tokens
On July 3, blockchain analytics company Lookonchain revealed that a whale/institution sold Ethereum-based tokens worth millions of dollars, including Lido DAO (LDO), Aave (AAVE), UniSwap (UNI), and Frax Share (FXS). Data shows they sold 3.13 million LDO, valued at $5.77 million, 49,771 AAVE, valued at $4.54 million; 269,177 UNI, valued at $2.41 million; and 250,969 FXS, valued at $0.708 million – all at a loss.
Following this market sell-off, token prices plummeted significantly. For example, according to CoinMarketCap data, LDO’s price fell by 14%, AAVE depreciated by 9%, UNI dropped by 5%, and FXS depreciated by 12%.
It is worth noting that after approving the spot Ethereum ETF in the form of 19b-4 in May 2024, this whale initially spent over $73 million on purchasing Ethereum (ETH) and related tokens. In addition to this massive dump, the whale also holds 3.33 million LDO, valued at $5.83 million, 31,191 AAVE, valued at $2.80 million.
Ethereum (ETH) price post-ETF update
This large-scale sell-off indicates that if the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission delays or postpones the Ethereum spot ETF again, we may see another large-scale sell-off of Ethereum and related tokens in the coming days. In fact, following the ETF update, the head of asset management giant Galaxy Digital, Steve Kurz, told Bloomberg that the SEC may approve a spot Ethereum ETF in the coming weeks.
On the price chart, ETH seems to be approaching a key support level of $3,250, below the 50 EMA (Exponential Moving Average). If ETH fails to hold this level, we may see a significant drop to the $2,870 level in the coming days.
Despite the optimism towards the Ethereum spot ETF and other Ethereum-based tokens, ETH has also dropped by 5% in the past 24 hours.