Santiment analysts explained the decline in Ether reserves on exchanges.

The decline in Ether reserves on cryptocurrency exchanges is occurring against the backdrop of rising staking volumes and increased use of the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization in decentralized finance (DeFi). Analysts from the platform Santiment report that only 3.49% of the asset's total supply now remains on major trading platforms.

Since June 1, this reserve figure has dropped by 1.16%. Santiment experts noted that exchange balances of Ether had already fallen this summer to levels comparable to those seen during Ethereum's early years.

Analysts estimate that approximately 35% of the total Ether supply is currently staked. The volume of funds locked within the decentralized finance ecosystem stands at roughly $53 billion. Santiment specialists also observe a significant imbalance favoring those looking to stake their coins: there are about 1.68 million ETH in the entry queue, compared to approximately 154,000 ETH in the withdrawal queue.

Analysts maintain that while a drop in exchange balances does not in itself guarantee a price increase, rising demand on the open market would mean fewer coins are readily available for immediate sale.

Earlier, CryptoQuant analysts noted that during the first week of June, Ether reserves on major cryptocurrency exchanges—Binance, OKX, Gemini, and Bitfinex—decreased by 475,000 coins. Binance saw its holdings drop from 3.87 million to 3.68 million ETH (a decline of 190,000 coins), while Bitfinex’s reserves fell from 2.67 million to 2.49 million ETH (a drop of 180,000 coins) over the same period.