Why Is Vitalik Buterin Selling ETH? $35 Million Sold This Month

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Vitalik Buterin, the creator of Ethereum, has sold 17,196 ETH this month. This is worth roughly $35 million. 

Vitalik started this year with over 240k ETH but his holdings have since dropped to 224k ETH. For a full breakdown of Vitalik’s net worth in 2026, read our research guide here.

Below is an interactive window showing Vitalik’s top crypto holdings. This information comes directly from the Arkham Intel Platform. 

Buterin has stated that the sale of the tokens is his "own share of the austerity" during the crypto market downturn. The price of Ethereum dipped below $2K in recent weeks.

The proceeds of the sale are intended to go towards the Ethereum Foundation’s goal of prioritizing long-term sustainability and core protocol development. 

Buterin announced the sale of 16,384 ETH on January 30th and, using the Arkham Intel Platform, the sale became visible on-chain a few days later. 

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However, since his announcement on X, and the subsequent sale of 16,384 ETH, Vitalik Buterin has sold even more ETH. 

The scale of these sales has sparked market speculation, but Buterin’s recent writings reveal a philosophical pivot. 

In his thesis on full-stack openness – published on his website –  he argues that as the internet merges with "real life" – impacting biotech, health, and governance – society must move away from proprietary "black box" systems.

The proceeds of his ETH sales are fueling this vision. Buterin is prioritizing "verifiability," supporting initiatives like open-source hardware that users can physically audit. 

For Vitalik, Ethereum is just one piece of a broader open-source stack designed to prevent a digital dystopia. By funding decentralized biotech and formally verified operating systems, he claims to be shifting focus from financial decentralization to securing the digital infrastructure of human existence.