Ethereum (ETH) for the first time in its history climbed above $2,500 on Thursday. This came in the wake of the network’s latest network upgrade – the Berlin hard fork.
By John Kiguru
Updated
3 mins read
On Thursday, the Ethereum network successfully upgraded after it hit block number 12,244,000. The Berlin hard fork upgrade was confirmed on March 8 and incorporates four major Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs). These improvements are geared towards reducing transaction costs and transaction types. As demand for the Ethereum network and token surges, there’s been a growing need to reduce the skyrocketing fees. EIP-2565 will achieve this using modular exponentiation.
Additionally, of the four major upgrades, EIP-2718, will allow the network to envelope multiple transactions solving the case for scalability on the blockchain. In the last couple of years, high gas fees and scaling problems have been critical issues for Ethereum pushing for the upgrade of the entire network.
However, the Berlin upgrade is not entirely polished. There have been reports of blocks, not Synchronizing. In fact, a number of crypto service providers including Coinbase and Ledger temporarily halted ETH and ERC-20 transactions. Thus, Coinbase disabled their withdrawal while they investigated the issue but this has since been solved.
The next upgrade towards the complete roll-out of the highly anticipated Ethereum 2.0 is the London hard fork. The London upgrade incorporates a proposal that reduces the supply of ether. With these upgrades, gas fees will not be sent to a miner to be added to a blockchain. The network will determine the fee and burn it. Notably, this is will slash miner profits and supply but increase ether value.
On the back of the upgrade, Ethereum surged to reach an all-time high of $2,547. This strong reaction was evidence of the high demand for the second-largest cryptocurrency. This demand has crossed from retailers to institutions noticeable by successive exchange withdrawals. The Rothschild Investment Corp is the latest to get some of the ETH action. Rothschild investment confirmed the purchase of 265,000 ETH on Thursday. The investment firm announced that its shares of the Grayscale Ethereum Trust were worth $4.75 million on March 31. Furthermore, this is more than double that of the Bitcoin trust. Strikingly, the Bitcoin trust only holds $1.92 million worth of BTC.
On top of institutional purchase, Ethereum was a major beneficiary of the Coinbase listing on Wednesday. As the second-largest cryptocurrency, it was second in line after Bitcoin to get exposure to traditional investors.
At the time press, Ethereum has slipped under $2,500 and is exchanging for $2,434. Holding above higher support, analysts expect some consolidation at this level before another retest of the $2,500 resistance. In the next couple of weeks, bulls foresee prices reaching $3,000 ahead of the next upgrade.
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Kiguru is a fine writer with a preference for innovation, finance, and the convergence of the two. A firm adherent to the groundbreaking capability of cryptographic forms of money and the blockchain. When not in his office, he is tuned in to Nas, Eminem, and The Beatles.
