ETH bounce back outperformed the market, recording the strongest rise to the sky since 2021.

Ethereum just closed the third quarter of 2025 with the strongest growth in over four years, reminiscent of the boom period when the price of ETH first surpassed the 4,000 USD mark in early 2021.

According to data from CoinGlass, ETH increased by 48.7% in July and 18.8% in August, before a slight adjustment of 5% in September. Despite this pullback, the coin still closed the quarter with a gain of 66.6%, reaching a new all-time high of 4,953 USD in August, thanks to steady buying from institutional funds and the return of retail investors.

This uptrend continues into October. ETH has increased by an additional 4% over the past week, reaching 4,300 USD – the highest level in several weeks – supported by the overall market recovery, with BTC and XRP also seeing significant gains.

Quarterly profits of Ethereum price since 2021 | Source: CoinGlass## Factors driving the price increase of ETH in Q3

Capital flow from financial institutions

The biggest factor behind the price increase of Ethereum in the past quarter is the strong capital flow from institutional investors.

During the period of July - August, nine ETH spot ETFs in the US attracted about 10 billion USD in new capital. Notably, BlackRock's ETHA fund surpassed the 10 billion USD in assets under management (AUM), becoming the third ETF in history to reach this milestone in just one year.

At the same time, corporate funds have also significantly increased their holdings of ETH. The total amount of ETH in corporate treasuries has risen from around 2 billion USD to over 23 billion USD in just one quarter, making ETH the fastest-growing digital asset in terms of treasury growth in the industry.

Matt Hougan – CIO of Bitwise – predicted back in July that:

“ETPs and companies holding ETH in their treasury can purchase an additional 20 billion USD worth of ETH over the next year, equivalent to approximately 5.33 million ETH at current prices.”

On-chain activities are booming

Not only thanks to institutional capital, Ethereum's on-chain activity also surged in Q3, solidifying ETH's central role in the DeFi space.

According to analysis by CryptoQuant, the number of Ethereum transactions – which has fluctuated around 900,000 to 1.2 million transactions per day over the past four years – has surged to a record 1.6–1.7 million transactions per day. This increase is in tandem with the price of ETH, indicating a strong correlation between network activity and valuation.

In addition, data from Token Terminal indicates that applications built on Ethereum – including stablecoins, DEX, and tokenized assets – currently hold about 355 billion USD of user assets. Currently, ETH is trading at a valuation of approximately 1.44 times the total value locked (TVL) of the ecosystem.

This analysis company asserts that the market capitalization of tokenized assets on Ethereum has acted as a floor for ETH valuation. This means that as more and more assets – from stablecoins to government bonds being tokenized – are brought onto the network, the market capitalization of ETH also grows correspondingly.

Ethereum DeFi and Market Capitalization | Source: Token Terminal## Conclusion

The developments in Q3 show that the price increase of Ethereum is not only driven by speculative factors but also based on a solid foundation: a strong influx of institutional capital, along with a noticeable expansion in utility and on-chain activity. This is a sign that ETH is entering a new growth cycle, linked to its central role in the decentralized financial market.

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