Ethereum drops 7% in massive sell-off, but will USDT save ETH?

Key Takeaways

How did the market shakeout hit Ethereum?

Ethereum dumped 7% on the week vs. Bitcoin’s smaller move. Meanwhile, Tether’s $1 billion USDT injection could fuel a dip buy or another squeeze.

What’s BitMine’s strategy amid this volatility?

BitMine added 264k ETH (over 2% of the network) and raised $1.28 billion via shares and warrants to bulk up its ETH stack.

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The 22nd of September delivered a brutal gut check for the crypto market. 

With $1.65 billion in longs liquidated, the market logged the largest deleveraging flush of 2025. Bitcoin [BTC] accounted for $263.4 million of that, with longs dominating 93.7% of the blow-ups.

Ethereum [ETH], however, took the brunt of the hit, seeing $375 million in total liquidations. The fallout? ETH dumped 7% on the week (roughly 3x BTC’s move) while the ETH/BTC ratio hit the month’s steepest dip.

Against this backdrop, Tether injected a fresh $1 billion USDT on Ethereum.

Strategically, the timing couldn’t have been better. The leverage unwind drained $180 billion across crypto, with ETH bleeding $44 billion. In this setup, fresh liquidity could either catch the dip or trigger another squeeze.

Historically, when Ethereum dumps harder than Bitcoin, it often snaps back stronger. Could this fresh liquidity be setting up the same move, with risk-on flows rotating back into ETH while BTC trails?

BitMine bets big on Ethereum amid market shakeout

Ethereum’s meltdown didn’t spare BitMine [NASDAQ: BMNR].

After two weeks of steady inflows pumping the stock 42% to $64, BMNR kicked off the last week of September with a 10.1% pullback, almost half of ETH’s 5.4% dip in the same stretch. Still, conviction hasn’t wavered.

In its latest filing, BitMine stacked an extra 264,378 ETH, taking its stash to 2.416 million ETH. Technically, that’s over 2% of the Ethereum network, with the company creeping toward its 5% supply target of 6 million ETH.

But the main play was all about BitMine’s long game.

On Monday, they rolled out a $365 million share raise at $70, plus warrants that could pull in another $913 million. That’s a total of $1.28 billion in fresh ammo to bulk up their ETH stack, reinforcing Ethereum’s bid wall.

In this setup, ETH’s recent liquidity squeeze feels like a clean reset, giving buyers a shot at the dip. With Ethereum still delivering 60%+ quarterly ROI, its risk-reward profile still looks solid for a bullish Q4.