Recently, I’ve been closely watching Ethereum’s price action and noticed an interesting turning point.

On April 13, the SEC released a staff statement, which is essentially meant to give the DeFi community some reassurance. The statement clearly states that as long as the neutrality, disclosure, and compensation conditions are met, providers of self-custody wallet interface services do not need to register as brokers under Section 15(b) of the Securities Exchange Act. In simple terms, it creates a legal safe harbor for front-end developers of mainstream protocols such as Uniswap, Aave, and Lido.

This is especially important for Ethereum because Ethereum is still the absolute dominant chain for DeFi. According to CoinGecko data, the total value locked on the Ethereum chain is about $116.88 billion, carrying the most concentrated DeFi ecosystem. Any regulatory framework that reduces legal risk is disproportionately beneficial to Ethereum.

In terms of market performance, ETH has rebounded from recent lows, and is currently trading around $2.31K. The 24-hour decline is -1.86%. This rebound is indeed a positive response to the SEC statement, and the bulls have started targeting the psychological level of $3,000—which would imply an upside of about 29% from the current price.

But there’s a real issue here. The Fear & Greed Index is currently only 21, placing the market in an extreme fear zone, which shows that risk appetite in the market is still quite subdued. The overall crypto market remains cautious, and trading activity is not particularly active—24-hour trading volume is at around $296.37M.

It’s worth noting that this SEC staff statement only reflects the views of the staff, not the commission’s official guidance, and it will automatically be withdrawn in 2031 unless the commission formally confirms it. This means the easing measure is temporary and could be scaled back or revoked.

From a broader perspective, the joint interpretation issued by the SEC and CFTC on March 17 is also crucial. It clearly points out that most crypto assets themselves are not securities. Combined with Goldman Sachs’ recent filing for a Bitcoin options ETF, traditional finance’s acceptance of digital assets is increasing—something that usually lifts the entire industry.

For ETH to keep pushing toward $3,000, the key is still whether the SEC will formalize this staff statement into binding guidance. If it’s only a rebound like this, it may be more of a cautious reaction to policy developments rather than a true trend reversal. Until market sentiment of “extreme fear” fully turns around, the sustainability of this rally remains limited. For now, ETH’s performance on CoinGecko still needs to be watched, and in the short term, regulatory certainty will be the main driver.