Ethereum network activity has reached all-time highs across multiple metrics, but the growth has failed to lift the price of ether or drive base layer fee generation.
A weekly report from analytics firm CryptoQuant published on March 10 found that daily active addresses on Ethereum approached 2 million in February 2026, surpassing peaks seen during the 2021 bull market. Active addresses are unique blockchain wallet addresses that have sent or received a transaction within a specific time period, such as the last 24 hours.
Smart contract calls, or codes on the blockchain that tell you to do something specific, topped 40 million per day, and token transfers driven by internal contract interactions also set records. The findings point to broad adoption in DeFi, stablecoins, and automated protocol activity, even as investment demand for ether has weakened.
The network’s record user activity generally bodes well for the market value of the native blockchain token. But that is not the case with Ethereum.
Its native token ether is down roughly 30% over the past six months, and the one-year change in Ethereum’s realized capitalization has turned negative, indicating net capital outflows from the market.
Exchange flow data from CryptoQuant shows that ether is moving into trading venues at a faster pace relative to bitcoin, a pattern consistent with elevated selling pressure.
Focus on capital flows
CryptoQuant argued that capital flows, rather than network activity, now more effectively explain ETH price dynamics.
In previous cycles, particularly in 2018 and 2021, increased on-chain activity coincided with price rallies. That relationship has weakened. The company’s dispersion analysis showed recent observations clustered at high levels of activity but relatively low prices, suggesting that incremental usage growth now has less explanatory power for ether valuation.
The rate panorama reinforces the disconnection. Data from DefiLlama shows that Ethereum generated approximately $10.3 million in transaction fees over the last 30 days, placing it in third place behind Tron with almost $25 million and Solana with around $20 million.
In terms of income, the gap widens even further. Ethereum ranked fifth in 30-day protocol revenue with $1.22 million, behind Tron, as well as Polygon, Base, and Solana. Base, an Ethereum layer 2 network built by Coinbase, generated approximately three times the revenue of the Ethereum protocol during the same period.
The disparity reflects the growing role of Ethereum’s layer 2 ecosystem. Networks like Base and Polygon process large volumes of transactions while paying relatively small settlement costs to the base chain, spreading economic activity across the broader Ethereum ecosystem rather than concentrating it on the base layer.
Stablecoins remain a bright spot for adoption. Ethereum is home to approximately $162 billion in stablecoin supply, approximately 52% of the global market, according to DefiLlama. However, that activity has not translated into commensurate value capture for ether itself.
Ethereum may be busier than ever, but the native blockchain asset is capturing less value created on it.
