It's a cycle that feeds each other. Hype of ETH post merge situation did not happen, it wasn't really something that people cared about, which means if there was no hype, there was no price increase, and if there was no price increase then there was no hype.
It feeds off each other, and that means we are going to end up with something that would cause a lot of trouble in the long run. Doesn't mean that it will stay that way, eventually ETH price will go up too, but that won't be anytime soon neither, it is going to be something that will take a long time. I personally wish to see the current situation change, but I am willing to wait years for that to happen.
That is something that gets broken out of nowhere for no good reason at all, and sometimes doesn't happen at all even with great news. The biggest examples are this and Elon to doge duo. Like for example ETH merge was a huge deal, we moved the second biggest coin in the rankings from PoW to PoS and that should have caused a huge deal, it should have gone up a lot and it should have been quite the good fun.
But, it didn't and we have no idea why it didn't at all. On the other hand, we are talking about Elon tweeting about doge, increasing its price back in the day, there was absolutely no connection, but somehow it did happen. So when will that cycle break is unknown to all.