Ethereum 2026: Is ETH Undervalued According to the MVRV Indicator?

Author: Rick, Messari Research Analyst; Translation: @GoldFinanceXZ

With 2026 approaching, the relationship between Ethereum’s price and fundamentals is clearer than ever since the NFT frenzy.

As of December 16, 2025, Ethereum’s price has fallen below $3,000. Based on the MVRV indicator and its dominant position in tokenized assets, ETH appears to offer a constructive long-term investment opportunity for allocators.

The MVRV Z-Score is used to assess whether ETH is overvalued or undervalued relative to its fair value. This indicator compares market capitalization (i.e., spot price multiplied by circulating supply) with realized value (i.e., the total capital inflow into ETH). It is formally defined as: MVRV Z-Score equals the difference between market cap and realized cap, divided by the standard deviation of market cap (cumulatively calculated from the earliest available data point).

During the NFT boom of 2021 to 2022, ETH’s MVRV Z-Score soared close to 6, indicating extreme market euphoria. Since The Merge, this indicator has reverted toward the mean, currently fluctuating mainly between 0 and 2—0 indicates undervaluation, 1 is near fair value, and 2 leans toward overvaluation. On May 7, 2025, when Ethereum’s significant upgrade Pectra went live, ETH was around $1,800, and the MVRV Z-Score was approximately -0.1. As the price subsequently hit new all-time highs, the MVRV gradually rose toward 2. By December 3, 2025, after the Fusaka upgrade, ETH traded at about $3,189, with an MVRV Z-Score of 0.47, indicating that at a significantly higher price level, it still appeared undervalued, suggesting a similar post-upgrade market structure but with more robust fundamentals.

On-chain data further reinforce the bullish thesis for Ethereum. In the asset tokenization space, Ethereum is the core settlement layer. According to RWA.xyz data (excluding stablecoins), Ethereum hosts a total of $11.9 billion in tokenized assets locked, accounting for 65.9% of the market share. While other layer 1s and rollups have developed, their scale remains far behind. As institutions migrate treasuries, credit, and other real-world assets onto crypto channels to improve capital efficiency and reduce operational costs, Ethereum’s liquidity, tooling ecosystem, and compliance-oriented infrastructure are continuously deepening its moat.

The low signals from the MVRV Z-Score, the positive price performance after upgrades, and the increasing dominance in tokenized assets all point in the same direction. However, this still only reveals a small part of Ethereum’s bullish narrative. As spot ETFs bring regulated capital into ETH, and digital asset treasury companies (DATs) continue to accumulate ETH supply, the market’s free float gradually tightens, and price sensitivity to marginal demand increases. For allocators seeking exposure with real economic throughput and scalable smart contracts, current ETH prices are more an opportunity to build core positions for 2026 than a risk at the cycle’s end.