What Makes Ethereum Stand Out
If we were to order cryptocurrencies according to their market capitalization, Ethereum would be in second place. This, however, doesn’t mean that Ethereum is any less important than Bitcoin as both cryptocurrencies are very different from each other. Ethereum has its own programming language and allows users to deploy smart contracts and decentralized applications.
The Base Layer of the Entire DeFi Ecosystem
Ethereum was launched on the 30th of July 2015. A week after the launch, the coin was hosted by Kraken and the trading price of 1 Ether was just below $2 with its peak at $2.77 per coin. Ethereum underwent a protocol upgrade called “Homestead” on the 15th of March 2016, which brought major improvements to the system. This caused the price of the coin to go past $15.
On the 28th of February 2017, Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA) was formed to improve the functionality of the platform. After the announcement, the price of Ether climbed to $49. Thanks to the prospect of institutional investors, EEA, and Bitcoin, the value of Ether continued to rise further with its trading price spiking to $233.79 per coin on the 30th of March 2017.
Another major milestone for Ethereum came on the 19th of December 2017 when the Ethereum blockchain processed a million transactions in a day. At this time 1 Ether costs $818. Ether continued to climb and reached the $1,000 mark for the first time on the 4th of January 2018. On the same date, the market capitalization of the digital currency reached $100 billion.
Just a few days later, Ether hit a new all-time high of $1,417 on the 10th of January 2018. This was partially caused by Ripple’s success but also due to more speculators entering the market. After a successful run, Ether experienced a slow decline to the $400 zone as $60 billion got wiped from the cryptocurrency market in February and Google banned cryptocurrency ads in March.
Unfortunately, the decline continued and by the end of 2018, the value of Ether dropped even further ($90 on the 12th of December 2018) with CFTC raising questions about Ethereum. Throughout the year 2019, the price of Ether didn’t cross the $400 zone ($320.06 on the 23rd of June 2019) and stayed pretty much stagnant with the coin trading mostly below $300.
On the 2nd of February 2021, Ether finally hits a new all-time high of $1,966. The next day, Paypal announced its intentions to start accepting cryptocurrencies – BTC, ETH, LTC, BCH. Ether reached its current all-time high of $4891.70 on the 10th of November 2021 as many other cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Solana, Cardano have also soared in price.
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