Written by: Sanqing, Foresight News
In February 2026, the cryptocurrency market continued to be sluggish, with Ethereum experiencing six consecutive months of declines in monthly line charts, with the maximum drop in the month close to 30%. During this period, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin executed 532 sell transactions from related addresses. According to Etherscan data, he completed his last sell transaction at 19:40 on February 26, selling approximately 19,326 ETH in total from the executing address.
Image source: Bitget market
Three "Transparencies": Announcement, Usage, and Public Execution
The plan for Vitalik's fund movement was announced in advance. On January 30, Vitalik posted a lengthy message through his personal X account, announcing that he would withdraw 16,384 ETH (worth about 44 million USD at the time) from his personal wallet and gradually liquidate it.
Image source: Vitalik's tweet
He explained that this action was his personal response to the Ethereum Foundation (EF) entering a "moderate contraction" phase. The EF plans to reduce its annual expenses from 15% of its treasury to 5% within five years, focusing more on core protocol development.
Vitalik also detailed the intended use of the funds in the post. The proceeds from this sale will be used to fund open-source projects and public goods, focusing on areas such as privacy technology (ZK proofs, fully homomorphic encryption FHE, differential privacy), security hardware, verifiable computing, encrypted communication, locally prioritized software, open-source operating systems, biotechnology/public health tools, and governance coordination mechanisms. Many of these areas are vital but marginal sectors following EF's contraction, and Vitalik emphasized that this was his personal decision to share the responsibility of EF's contraction.
Additionally, the entire selling process was traceable through on-chain tools. Vitalik utilized a single address (0xfEB016D0D14AC0Fa6d69199608B0776d007203B2) and executed small to medium-sized sales in batches through a single protocol (CoW Swap) to minimize market impact.
One "Surprise": Execution Volume Slightly Higher than Announced
Despite the high transparency, the execution results differed slightly from the initial announcement. The actual amount sold from Vitalik's address exceeded the previously announced 16,384 ETH, totaling approximately 19,326 ETH sold (over 2,942 ETH more).
This sale began in the early morning of February 3, paused for about 10 days, and resumed selling again on the 22nd, with acceleration mainly occurring in the last two days. Among these, approximately 4,211.5 ETH were sold on February 5, about 2,283 ETH on the 25th, and approximately 6,297 ETH on the 26th.
Data source: Etherscan & Bitget | Note: Data on the 26th is up to the moment of the last sell transaction
Regarding the total announced quantity being merely a rough target, or if there were undisclosed changes during the execution, Vitalik has not provided further clarification at this time.
Vitalik previously stated: "Since 2018, I have never sold ETH for personal wealth accumulation; all proceeds from sales have basically been used for donations, funding open-source projects, or charitable causes."
Image source: Vitalik Farcaster article
In contrast to some projects quietly dumping their assets, leading to collapses or trust crises afterwards, Vitalik's "open sale of coins" seems to indeed be healthier. This ETH sale plan, at least on the surface, also continued the path of transparency and non-personal profit.
However, objectively speaking, the founder accelerating the sale of coins as the price continues to decline at rebound points may deal some blow to the community and investor confidence. Market sentiment is already fragile; Vitalik's actions may amplify FUD, potentially adding to the overall bearish pressure, pushing ETH further down. In the short term, this may exacerbate selling among holders, affecting Ethereum's rebound trend and ecological stability.
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