Introduction
Ethereum is a public, open-source, blockchain-based computing platform, and operating system, which features a smart contract computer protocol. Ethereum exchange units are called Ether and abbreviation ETH is used for its indication. Unlike other cryptocurrencies, the creators do not limit the role of Ether to payments, but offer it, for example, as a means for exchanging resources or registering transactions with assets using smart contracts. Ethereum as a platform was proposed by Vitalik Buterin, a programmer and cryptocurrency researcher, in 2013, and afterwards its further development was funded by online crowdfunding.
Achievements
Currently, Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency in the world by capitalization and definitely very widespread as it has around 92 million users in total right now. But what stands behind this success?
First of all, this cryptocurrency manages to use smart contracts in a very effective way, that allows performing a credible transaction without third parties. In addition, these transactions are trackable and irreversible. The main goal of smart contracts is to provide the highest level of security which is superior to the traditional contract law as well as to decrease transaction costs that are somehow associated with contracting.
According to the New York Times, by March 2016, there were dozens of functional applications built on the Ethereum platform: decentralized applications, decentralized autonomous organizations, and smart contracts. Examples of such applications and platforms are:
- decentralized and investment funds;
- socio-economic platform Backfeed;
- platforms for monetization of ratings in games (ex. FreeMyVunk).
Also, on February 28, 2017, the creation of Enterprise Ethereum Alliance, the non-profit organization was announced, and now it is exploring the possibilities of using the Ethereum blockchain for corporate needs. The membership of this alliance has amazed all the world’s cryptocurrency experts: it includes Intel, Microsoft, J.P. Morgan, and several other large technology companies and financial institutions.
Statistics
The price of ETH has started to rise from its near-zero price from the start of 2017 and reached its peak of around $1300 at the beginning of 2018. After this year, its price has slowly started to go down and fluctuate between $87 and $300. The COVID-19 pandemic has also influenced the price development of Ethereum cryptocurrency: in February 2020 the price was around $264, however, it dropped to $108 in March. According to CoinMarketCap up-to-date data,12/05/2020, Ethereum (ETH) has the following characteristics, being ranked the second cryptocurrency by its price:
- Current Price: $189.81
- Market Cap: $21 049 392 624 USD
- Volume (24 h): $19 265 406 038 USD
- Circulating Supply: 110 896 292 ETH
Technical analysis
TradingView website provides a comprehensive technical analysis for Ethereum cryptocurrency. Most of the Oscillators display a Neutral action and only Momentum indicator is stating a Buy action. However, practically all of the Moving averages, starting from Exponential moving average, show Buy action for ETH. Overall, the Summary states that the main action that needs to be taken in 2020 about Ethereum cryptocurrency is Buy. Pivots for ETH/USD cryptocurrency are represented in the table below.
Price prediction
According to Coinpredictor.io and its Price-Based forecast algorithm, the price of Ethereum is going to move towards $235.35 in 7 days, however, in one month the drop will be -43.1% with price approaching $121.85. In 3 months, the price of ETH will target $161.47 with an overall long-term forecast, displaying that Ethereum will be descending in its dollar value.
30rates website displays fluctuating statistics for Ethereum price prediction, stating that in a month the price of this cryptocurrency will be around $289, however, the price value will be very unstable and change in a range between $209 and $297.
In addition to the above information, the Coinpedia website, in contrast, suggests that the ETH may move upward, under the Bitcoin price increase up to $10,000 due to the correlation between these two cryptocurrencies.
Plans
Ethereum is currently seeing huge progress in terms of scaling and recently a significant milestone of 10 million mined blocks has been reached, which is 9.27 million more blocks than Bitcoin. Aaron Henshaw, a founder of blockchain provider Bison Trails, said: “Ethereum just reached 10M blocks! The progress from the genesis block in 2015 is incredible. There are many exciting layer 2 solutions launching this year (like keep_project, NuCypher, SkaleNetwork) that will help ETH scale even further”.
Besides, BitMEX Research has announced information about Ethereum 2.0 launch on their Twitter, claiming the following: “Ethereum 2.0 is set to launch as early as July 2020, assuming no further delays. Given the decision to scale via sharding, we believe there is little choice other than to attempt this incredibly complex multi-year transition to a new network”.
Thus, it seems like the Ethereum platform is not giving up and is trying to get as much attention as possible in a cryptocurrency world.
Disclaimer
This article doesn’t provide any advice and directions regarding the investments in particular cryptocurrencies and pursues only informative purposes.
