ETH holding above the $3,250 mark with validator exit queues finally clearing up—a solid sign for the network's stability. The infrastructure metrics keep showing green across the board even though price action hasn't quite matched Bitcoin's momentum lately. Here's the thing though: when Ethereum really gets moving, the whole DeFi ecosystem tends to follow suit. It's not just about the ETH price itself; it's about what that movement signals for liquidity, yield opportunities, and on-chain activity across the entire layer. That cascading effect is exactly why Ethereum's next leg matters so much for the broader crypto stack.