Everyone's arguing about ETH price and nobody's looking at what's actually changing

Was scrolling last night and saw someone ask where ETH would be next year. The comments saying 5000, some saying back to 800. People focused on arguing about price but completely ignored what ETH is actually doing.

ETH's biggest problem is slow. It can only handle about 30 transactions per second, it's slow and expensive, everyone knows. But the Ethereum team has two big upgrades planned for 2026 and when those are done it's not just a little bit faster, it's like dozens of times faster. Then there's another one coming in 2027 and by then the whole network should be processing transactions faster than swiping your Visa. Then it won't be slow or expensive to use anymore.

Another thing people barely talk about is the ETF side. ETH ETFs already got approved, but the ETH inside them is basically just sitting there and cannot be staked. It is kind of like owning a stock that pays yield, except the fund tells you that yield does not go to you. The SEC has a new chair now and the tone has become a lot softer. If staking gets allowed in 2026, then institutions would not just be buying ETH to hold it. They would be buying something that can also earn yield. And once ETH inside ETFs gets locked up for staking, that means even less supply is out there to be sold.

The on chain side kinda interesting too. BlackRock, which is about as big as it gets, chose Ethereum for tokenized assets. Not because ETH is the fastest chain, but because it has been around the longest and people trust it not to break. Stablecoins are still huge on Ethereum too, and every transfer uses ETH in some way. That is why I do not really buy the idea that ETH is only being propped up by speculation. There are still real things happening on it every day.

And all those ETH killers everyone was hyped about? DOT ADA AVAX? Go look at them now. Meanwhile stuff that left Ethereum is coming back,like Polymarket and Synthetix. I was also watching the order book on bydfi for a while and buyers were way heavier than sellers. Price got down at one point and bounced right back up. Thats means down there is buying everything.

I honestly don't know where ETH will be next year but it really feels like it's about to make some big moves