Ethereum (ETH) price has crashed to below $1,600 (at the time of writing) and crypto industry professionals are now offering some perspective on where they think the digital assets market will go from here, and how it may perform in the foreseeable future. Bankless co-founder Ryan Sean Adams has issued a warning about Ethereum’s long-term viability, declaring that the network cannot succeed as a project unless its native token, ETH, emerges as a reliable global store of value.
In his most recent public remarks via X, Adams rejected the increasingly common view that separates enthusiasm for the Ethereum blockchain from the performance of its cryptocurrency.
He described this mindset as a core logical error that has shaped his own advocacy since the earliest days of writing and podcasting on the topic.
Without ETH reaching a market capitalization in the trillions and functioning as a reliable monetary asset, he argued, Ethereum as a whole must be viewed as having fallen short of its ambitions.
There is simply no viable version of a thriving Ethereum ecosystem that operates independently of a high-value ETH.
Adams framed ETH as the essential economic fuel for decentralized finance.
It provides the shared security, liquidity, and incentive alignment—often summarized in Ethereum circles as enabling credible neutrality, openness, permissionlessness, and shared prosperity—that DeFi requires to scale meaningfully.
Vitalik on ETH the asset.
Yes. He finally said plainly that ETH is the most valuable product of Ethereum. https://t.co/Cc77SxPBvc pic.twitter.com/zk4rmMs21B
— RYAN SΞAN ADAMS – rsa.eth 🦄 (@RyanSAdams) May 24, 2026
He likened the “Ethereum, not ETH” position to claiming one supports America while dismissing its economy.
The two elements function as a single engine; weaken the asset, and the network’s capacity to store value, settle transactions, and power decentralized applications inevitably erodes.
He dismissed softer narratives that treat blockchain infrastructure as somehow detached from its native crypto asset.
Such framing, Adams said, may suit centralized or permissioned systems, but it has no place for genuinely decentralized, crypto-native protocols like Ethereum, Bitcoin, or Zcash.
Better to confront the possibility of failure directly than to sustain an illusion that the platform can flourish while its monetary layer stagnates. The timing of Adams’ comments adds weight.
They follow Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin’s recent acknowledgment that ETH itself represents the blockchain’s most financially significant product. Adams welcomed the statement as a long-overdue recognition of the asset’s central role.
The remarks also arrive against the backdrop of internal Bankless discussions, including David Hoffman’s reported decision to sell his ETH holdings—a move that has intensified community debate about the network’s direction, its value-capture mechanisms, and the tension between architectural philosophy and monetary outcomes.
Adams did not shy away from the implications. He noted that Ethereum’s design prioritizes DeFi built on a decentralized monetary base.
If ETH cannot fulfill that role—whether through use as a store of value, medium of exchange, or unit of account—then the broader vision of a censorship-resistant, globally relevant settlement layer remains unfulfilled.
Improvements to staking yields, collateral usage, or other mechanisms may help, but they do not erase the fundamental requirement: a robust ETH is not a side effect of Ethereum’s success but its prerequisite.
The stance has sparked productive conversation across the Ethereum community. While some see it as a necessary reality check, others view it as overly reductive. But these kinds of discussions are actually healthy and should be encouraged across the crypto space.
And to be clear, Adams’ core perspective and outlook remains uncompromising. For Ethereum to deliver on its founding principles and ethos, ETH must move beyond speculative utility and become a viable global store of value.
Anything less, he maintains, signals mission failure rather than any kind of partial progress. While these views seem a bit extreme, it can be argued that they are not too unrealistic given Ethereum’s considerable potential for tokenization, RWAs applications, stablecoin issuance, among other use-cases.