Over 1M post-Shanghai upgrade ETH withdrawals fail to dent risk appetite

After the Shapella (Shanghai and Capella) upgrade that was successfully completed on March 12, over 1 million staked ETH tokens have been withdrawn from nearly 477,805 transactions. The ETH withdrawals crossed the one million mark on Sunday as the Ethereum price touched an eleven-month high.

The Ethereum price surge quashed the hopes of the Shappella upgrade being a bearish event.

Shappella was to be a “sell the news” event

Some crypto analysts previously opined that the Shappella upgrade could be bearish for Ethereum prices. They believed the event could “sell the news” event with the likes of JP Morgan foreseeing the selling of staked ETH balances belonging to “troubled entities.”

Elsewhere, the Bank of America said fundamental issues for the broader Ethereum network still linger on, evening out bullish impetus from Shapella.

ETH selling has however remained lukewarm so far as a majority of validators restaking the withdrawn ether and others sending it to crypto exchanges to capture other trading opportunities instead of liquidating the ETH for US dollars or stablecoins.

For example, data from the on-chain tool Lookonchain shows that more than 19,000 ETH from three wallets were withdrawn and quickly retstaked on Ethereum, in a move that is probably to test if the feature works smoothly. Several other wallets withdrew and restaked more than 34,000 ETH worth over $72 million.

Other ether addresses, like the “0x08De” withdrew more than 50,000 ETH and transferred it to an Ethereum staking pool and spot wallets.

Ethereum price movements

Since surging above $2,000 post Shapella upgrade, Ethereum price has consolidated around $2,000 in the midst of the over one million ETH withdrawals rising fears of a price correction although there are still chances of a bullish breakout.

At press time, Ethereum was trading at around $2,104 up 16% in the last 14 days.