The Ethereum Foundation (EF) announced on Wednesday that it will convert 5,000 ETH, valued at approximately $11 million, into stablecoins. The swap will be executed using CoWSwap's Time-Weighted Average Price (TWAP) feature, marking the foundation's first TWAP sale since October, when it sold 1,000 ETH for roughly $4.5 million.
This transaction is described as a routine operation to fund the organization's research and development, grant programs, and other ecosystem activities. The funds are being drawn from a wallet identified by Arkham Intelligence as the "Ethereum Foundation DeFi Ecosystem" wallet. Notably, the EF has largely moved away from recurring ETH sales to fund operations after years of public criticism, opting instead for strategies like deploying capital in DeFi protocols and staking ETH to generate income.
The foundation had initially seeded this DeFi Ecosystem wallet with 50,000 ETH in January 2025. Earlier this month, the EF announced it had staked 47,050 ETH, progressing toward a goal of 70,000 ETH. In a separate move in March, the foundation sold 5,000 ETH (worth about $10.2 million) to BitMine Immersion Technologies in an over-the-counter (OTC) trade. This followed a previous OTC sale of 10,000 ETH to SharpLink Gaming in July 2025.
According to Arkham data, the Ethereum Foundation's main wallet currently holds significant assets: 102,000 ETH (worth ~$228 million), 21,000 AETHWETH (~$47 million), and 6,000 WETH (~$14 million). It also holds approximately $1 million in DAI and USDC stablecoins.
In related news, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has also recently swapped millions of dollars worth of ETH into stablecoins to fund open-source projects. Additionally, on Tuesday, the EF sent about $70,000 worth of ETH to a grant provider address, its first transaction series since staking ETH on the Beacon Chain.
