Bankless co-founder sells ETH as token lags 57% from all-time high

Bankless co-founder David Hoffman disclosed on May 21 that he sold all his Ethereum holdings, ending a years-long public bet on ETH that helped define his career as a crypto media personality. ETH traded near $2,111 at the time of the announcement, down 57% from its all-time high of $4,946 reached in August 2025, CoinGecko data shows. The token has been largely rangebound for five years, failing to sustain rallies above prior cycle peaks.

"The ETH is Money thesis didn't fail... it played out," Hoffman wrote, explaining that Ethereum's structural design as a "giver, not a taker" means the network provides secure blockspace and tokenization at cost while layer-2 networks capture most fee revenue. He said he remains "massively bullish" on Ethereum the network but expects only a "marginal amount" of that success to be reflected in ETH. "Ethereum takes no markup for anything it does. This is the nature of open source software, and this is the power of Ethereum," he added.

Former Ethereum core developer Eric Connor said he did not blame Hoffman, attributing ETH's underperformance to selling pressure from early millionaires created during its explosive early run-up rather than fundamental protocol shortcomings. "At the end of the day, maximalism to a single coin when it comes to portfolio management is pretty silly," Connor said. Bankless co-founder Ryan Sean Adams called the sale the "end of an era" as the media outlet transitions into its second phase, with Hoffman taking over leadership while Adams steps into a backseat role.

The sale lands as ETH tests a fragile support zone between $2,050 and $2,100, having failed to build momentum above $2,300. Bitmine, the largest Ether treasury company, has continued accumulating at pace, targeting 6 million ETH or 5 percent of circulating supply, while staked Ether hit a record 39.2 million tokens, or 32.19 percent of supply, according to the Ethereum Validator Queue. Another 3.3 million ETH sits in the entry queue, while only 234,368 ETH is waiting to exit, signaling sustained conviction among stakers despite the price decline.

The divergence between network usage and token price — Ethereum dominates stablecoins, tokenization and DeFi activity while ETH struggles to capture value — remains the central question for investors. As layer-2 ecosystems absorb an increasing share of economic activity, Hoffman's thesis suggests the network may continue to win while its native token fails to outperform, a dynamic that could reshape how the market prices ETH going forward.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.