Ethereum (ETH), the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency, has just broken the $2,000 threshold today, with prices reaching as high as $2,081.32 according to collated data from the CoinMarketCap index as of press time.
This new record breaks its previous record set back in February 19th this year, when it hit $2,041. Since then, ETH has seen two corrections on its daily chart, placing out on a higher low with the second correction seeing a $1,293 dip just days after hitting $2k. Ethereum now holds some $239 billion according to its total market capitalization. By comparison, the total value locked (TVL) for decentralized finance (DeFi) has reached a new record high of $74 billion, rising up since the general market pullback experienced in late February.
Prices for ETH have reached the new all-time high after breaking out from a descending resistance line. Several factors may be attributed to as the reasons why Ethereum’s rally up the scale has been bullish so far. First, the NFT boom. Second, the recent adoption of Ethereum-run applications like the USDC stablecoin to mainstream financial products such as Visa. Third, the steady rise of decentralized finance (DeFi).
Despite this positive note on the cryptocurrency’s price, its users are still plagued with soaring gas fees. According to data from ETH Gas Station, the average gas price for a standard Ethereum transaction costs 164 Gwei, or around $7 USD. As more and more applications are built into Ethereum’s protocol, solutions to scale up and resolve this problem of gas fees have been proposed and approved.
Ethereum is nearing its Berlin Upgrade, scheduled at block height 12 244 000, or around April 14 on the protocol’s mainnet. The upgrade follows the Istanbul and Muir Glacier upgrades and includes several EIPs: EIP-2565 or the ModExp Gas Cost; EIP-2718 or the Typed Transaction Envelope; EIP-2929 or Gas cost increase for state access opcodes, and EIP-2930 or Optional access lists.
Details on these improvement upgrades have been listed through Ethereum community-led documentation here. CryptoDaily has previously covered details for EIP-1559 and what its implementation would mean for the Ethereum blockchain.
As Ethereum transitions to Eth2 or Ethereum 2.0 with its switch from Proof of Work to a Proof of Stake consensus algorithm, it remains to be seen whether it will hold over its stability and mirror the steadily bullish trend of the crypto market in general, following Bitcoin’s recent break into $60,000.
Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
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