Despite the successful implementation of the Pectra upgrade, the market response is markedly sluggish as ETH prices only recorded a modest 5% uptick. What lowers the price of ETH?
Ethereum (ETH) successfully implemented the Pectra upgrade on May 7th, but the market response was overwhelming. On the day of the upgrade, ETH opened at $1,849 and closed at $1,811, recording a drop of just 2%. At the time of pressing, ETH was trading at $1,936, earning just 5% since opening on May 7th.
The suppressed response can be partially due to macro headwinds. Most notably, uncertainty in global trade due to the ongoing tariff war. However, the decline in Ethereum performance precedes current market risks. Over the past few months, ETH Price has consistently slowed down the broader crypto market as it has continued to slow down other layer 1 performance in terms of user growth.
From July 2023 to April 2025, Ethereum's active addresses, a key indicator of network utilities and user growth, ranged almost from 400,000 to 600,000. This has surged to more than 2.5k active addresses (TON), in contrast to competitors like Tron (TRX), peaking at 3.6k active addresses at one time point, then surpassing Ethereum in terms of user activity.
Source: IntotheBlock
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However, Ethereum still leads in locked totals, currently at $52.6 billion. This suggests trust from institutional players in Ethereum's security and long-term viability. However, lower address activities reduced demand from retail investors. This is often the key driver behind a bull run.
Pectra upgrades have introduced meaningful upgrades, such as lower blob fees and improved wallet usability, but they cannot address key barriers to user growth.
As far as ETH prices go, investors are likely to need clear evidence of increased network adoption in terms of user growth as well as TVLs that are already locked, and bridging is the key to achieving this.
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