Institutional Ethereum buying rises, but bearish market structure remains intact

Institutional interest in Ethereum [$ETH] was alive, AMBCrypto reported. The leading altcoin’s price decline presented an “attractive buying opportunity,” said Tom Lee, chairman of Bitmine, the largest $ETH treasury firm.

The company added 71,762 $ETH to its balance sheet last week and was fast closing in on its “alchemy of 5%” target.

Institutional buying spree not enough to shift Ethereum market opinion

BMNR’s acquisitions were hopeful, but conviction has been skewed toward Bitcoin [$BTC] rather than Ethereum.

This was made evident when comparing the net taker volume of the two crypto assets. The 30-day moving average of $BTC’s net taker volume remained positive despite its correction from $82k earlier in May.

Meanwhile, Ethereum was flashing “structural weakness,” warned analyst CryptoOnchain. The net taker volume peaked in early March but has plummeted since then, showing sellers have the upper hand.

The market has a clear preference for $BTC over $ETH, and this is reflected by the 30-day moving average of the net taker volume.

Sentiment reaches lows not seen since 2023

The Coinbase Premium Index fell into negative territory towards the end of April and has stayed there. The premium was falling further in recent days following the 10.19% price correction within the past two weeks.

The taker buy/sell ratio measures the volume of taker, or market orders, to assess whether bears or bulls have the short-term upper hand. Aggressive orders drive price moves and are a sign of market participants’ persuasion.

Analyst Darkfost observed that the weekly taker Buy/Sell Ratio was at 0.91, the lowest since 2023. This bearish skew in the Futures market highlighted the prevailing negative opinion behind $ETH recently.

It must be noted that the more aggressively the market positions to one side, the greater the likelihood of a squeeze in the opposite direction.

The higher timeframe $ETH price structure was bearish. After clashing with the seller bastion at $2.4k multiple times since March, the bulls have been forced to let go of two short-term support levels around $2.1k-$2.2k.

The price action and the onchain capital flows highlighted the pessimistic mood around Ethereum that BMNR’s acquisitions have not been able to dispel.

Final Summary

• The market taker volume indicated buyers have a preference for Bitcoin over Ethereum.
• This factor explained the latter’s relative weakness, a trend that could get stronger the lower its prices reach.