The number one altcoin has put up a slow day at the office, but still managed more than 12% of the gains for the week.
It is not often that crypto markets are dominated by one altcoin, although this seems to be the crypto climate right now, with Ethereum tearing it apart on the price charts.
The number one altcoin managed more than 12% of the gains for the week. Also, 30-day gains have crossed over 60% for ETH as it stands.
Undeniably, the $2K breakout this week caught many in the crypto community by surprise, after the final testnet came to pass.
The Beginning Draws near
The ETH storm has calmed down. At press time, ETH was trading below the $2k resistance.
Notably, this hasn’t stopped social channels from being flooded with talk about Ethereum and especially the Merge.
Overall, it’s been a bullish week for the 2nd largest cryptocurrency. In fact, ETH outperformed Bitcoin ahead of the Merge event in September.
According to Lunar Crush, Ethereum topped the charts for social activity among the top cryptocurrencies.
The rapid increase in social activity is visible in the Ethereum social volume metric. Ethereum has regularly maintained a high index value in recent weeks.
Meanwhile, interest in the proof-of-stake transition continues to attract investors.
Data from CryptoQuant revealed that active ETH addresses climbed to new highs (>400,000 in a day), compared to its previous figures. Additionally, analytics firm Glassnode disclosed that the total value of ETH 2.0 contracts reached an all-time high of 13,302,229 ETH on August 14. This reflects the growing confidence of the crypto community in the most high-profile Ethereum upgrade of all time.
Glassnode added that the profitability in ETH trading has been increasing lately. This is not a surprise as prices have been swinging while recovering from the June low. In fact, the MVRV (1d MA) hit a 3-month high of 1,226 on Aug 14 with a previous similar high seen at 1,225 on Aug 13.
Not everything is changing
That said, a pool of Ethereum miners will continue to work with the proof-of-work mechanism, according to IntoTheBlock, the implied valuation of ETHPow at a price of $114 is well over $10 billion.
This group is sure to face some challenges as Chainlink oracles and Circle USDC have pledged to support ETHPoW.
However, they have convinced exchanges like Huobi, Poloniex, and BitMEX to back their ETHPoW token, which is expected to be 6% of the value of ETH.
ETH looks poised to consolidate near the $2,000 resistance at least until the meltdown.
It will undoubtedly be under the control of most cryptanalysts due to the magnitude of the promised changes.
By Audy Castaneda
