Ethereum Defends $1,560 Support as Demand Stays Weak

Ethereum News

Ethereum (ETH) is defending the $1,560 area, holding a multi-week support band even as the broader trend stays firmly in bear market territory. Buyers have repeatedly stepped in near the lows, preventing a deeper breakdown, but every bounce has run into heavy overhead supply. The token continues to trade inside a bearish market structure on both daily and four-hour charts, with sellers active on each attempt to reclaim higher ground. Our reading of the order flow is that stabilization, not reversal, best describes the setup for Ethereum — the floor is holding, yet conviction on the buy side remains thin and demand for a sustained recovery has not materialized.

On the daily timeframe, ETH remains locked inside a well-defined descending channel, trading beneath both the 100-day and 200-day moving averages, which continue to slope lower overhead. The decisive breakdown below the $1.85K support, followed by a retest and rejection, confirmed that sellers retain control of the larger structure. Price is now range-bound across roughly $1.45K to $1.55K, the zone that has absorbed selling and capped further downside. For Ethereum to shift momentum, buyers must reclaim $1.85K and then challenge the $2K to $2.2K supply band, where the declining averages and the channel’s upper boundary converge into a dense layer of resistance.

The four-hour chart offers the first constructive signal in weeks: ETH has broken above the descending trendline that capped price through last week’s slide. That breakout marks a tentative improvement in short-term structure, and price is now retracing to retest the broken line. A successful defense would lend credibility to a relief move. Yet $1.75K horizontal resistance remains the immediate obstacle, and a clean break above it would be required before any push toward $1.85K. Momentum has firmed, with short-term RSI recovering off oversold levels toward the neutral 50 mark — easing selling pressure without yet confirming a reversal.

Exchange data points to persistently weak spot demand, particularly through Coinbase, where U.S. institutional flow is typically measured. On-chain and exchange price data show the Coinbase premium remaining subdued, a sign that domestic institutional buyers are not aggressively accumulating at these levels. This soft backdrop reinforces the cautious technical picture: without renewed bids from larger players, rallies risk fading into the same overhead supply that rejected price earlier. As a leading altcoin, Ethereum’s recoveries have historically leaned on institutional participation, and the current absence of that flow keeps the burden of proof firmly on the bulls.

A separate strain on sentiment is Ethereum’s standing against Bitcoin. The ETH/BTC ratio — the price of one ether expressed in bitcoin, which strips out the market-wide move to show which asset is actually winning — sits near multi-year lows around 0.026. That marks deep relative underperformance, well below the ratio’s prior all-time-high readings, and down sharply from roughly 0.08 in 2021 and 0.15 in 2017. A falling ratio signals Bitcoin dominance and risk-off caution, the opposite of the conditions that fuel a healthy altcoin environment.

What drives the ratio is a tug-of-war between Ethereum-specific and Bitcoin-specific forces. On Ethereum’s side sit ETF flows, staking dynamics, layer-2 activity that feeds automated market maker volume, supply mechanics and competition from rival chains; on Bitcoin’s side sit halving cycles plus ETF and treasury demand. The ratio can stay depressed for years, so it informs context rather than dictating entries. At current levels it reflects a market favoring bitcoin’s perceived safety over Ethereum’s growth narrative. A durable turn would likely require renewed ETF inflows or a pickup in on-chain activity — catalysts that, for now, remain absent as the broader market trades defensively.

COINOTAG’s proprietary 42-indicator composite scoring engine rates the $1,612 resistance at 78/100 — the strongest barrier overhead — driven by the confluence of R1, the prior daily close and the Fibo 0.114 level. On the downside, the engine scores the $1,550 support at 63/100, anchored by the previous day’s low and a MACD cross, marking the line bulls must hold. Our derivatives read leans cautious: the perpetual funding rate is marginally negative at -0.0010%, open interest stands near $5.78 billion, and the long/short account ratio of 3.91 shows 79.7% of accounts positioned long — a crowded book vulnerable to a squeeze. With RSI at 34.59 and Fear & Greed at 15 (Extreme Fear), a daily close below $1,550 would invalidate the stabilization thesis and open the path toward $1,481.