Ethereum's native token Ether (ETH) will extend its 30% slump this year to the lowest price level since July 2021, if a textbook technical indicator plays out.

ETH's price fell to its six-month low of $2,159 on Jan. 24, 2022, only to rebound sharply to as high as $2,724 days later. However, this created a so-called "bear flag" chart pattern that suggests the price could drop to $2,000 or a 17% drop from current levels.

A bear flag appears on the chart when the price consolidates higher after a strong momentum downwards but eventually moves further lower after breaking out of the upward range. In doing so, the price tends to drop by as much as the length of the previous decline, called "flagpole."

In Ether's case, the flagpole's height comes to be over $850. That roughly shifts its bear flag price target towards $2,000. Earlier this year, another bear flag formation had resulted in a similar decline, as shown in the chart above.

The prospect of Ether hitting $2,000 in the coming months increases further due to Bitcoin (BTC) and its vulnerability to macroeconomic trends.

Notably, the positive correlation efficiency between the Ethereum token and Bitcoin has been 0.92 in the past 30 days, according to data from CryptoWatch. In other words, Ether tailed the BTC price trends with a 92% accuracy in January 2022.

At the core of the said bearish outlook is the Federal Reserve's dovish policy. In detail, the U.S. central bank's decision to completely withdraw its $120 billion a month Covid-19 stimulus program by early March and to increase benchmark rates from their near-zero levels after that have started hurting the so-called pandemic winners, including tech stocks, gold, and Bitcoin.

Paul Krugman, a Nobel prize-winning economist and