Ethereum Holds $1,900 Into FOMC While Layer 2 Activity Keeps Draining
$ETH trades at $1,905, refusing to fall below $1,900, even as $BTC races down. It appears ETH would hold the $1,900 level heading into today's Fed decision, and the momentum signals aren’t negative yet.
On the daily chart, since $ETH touched a $1,500 low in June, it has maintained higher highs and lows, breaking into the $1,900 demand zone in mid-July and has been grinding higher along the rising trendline since; with $1,900 now acting as the pivot between what was a former resistance turned support for the next leg up.
The FOMC decision lands today at 2:00 p.m. ET, with no Summary of Economic Projections at this meeting, and the market is holding right at a structurally important level walking into it; a hawkish surprise tests the trendline and $1,880 support, a dovish read likely pushes ETH back toward Tuesday's $1,928 high.
Away from the chart, Ethereum's Layer 2 ecosystem is showing real strain. Layer 2 total value locked has fallen to roughly $5 billion, the lowest level since 2023, nearly erasing the growth that followed the 2024 launches of Optimism ($OP), Arbitrum ($ARB), and ZKsync ($ZK).
Notwithstanding, Optimism, Base, and Arbitrum still account for about 96% of that $4.8 billion in remaining TVL, so the drawdown isn't evenly spread; it's concentrated capital leaving the same networks that drove the original growth. That decline has coincided with turnover at the Ethereum Foundation, which has lost several senior leaders since the start of the year, including a co-executive director, alongside layoffs.
Back to the charts, if the ascending trendline holds with RSI staying above 50, and we get a dovish Fed today, $ETH would push through $1,928 toward the $1,975-1,980 area from last week's high.
On the bear side, the daily MACD histogram is already flipping negative; a hawkish Fed would force $ETH to drop below $1,900 and retest the trendline near $1,850 while the L2 TVL slide adds to the fundamental drag.
$1,900 is the level to watch into the 2 p.m. print.
