Ethereum has had a pretty miserable 2019. Things could get worse before the year is out though as the asset gets dumped on exchanges and community angst grows.
Ethereum Has Had a Rough Year
The world’s second largest crypto asset by market cap is currently trading lower than it was this time last year. According to Tradingview.com, another slide today has dropped prices below $125, leaving ETH is in danger of falling back to $100.
Over the past week, the digital asset has dumped almost 20% and those losses appear to be extending. According to ViewBase, which measures mass token dumps, large amounts of Ethereum are being sent to exchanges.
204,530 $ETH has been sent to exchanges, with 89,058 ETH going to #Kraken, 25,908 ETH going to #Binance and 99,987 ETH to #Huobi respectively. pic.twitter.com/CbjqqZRdJy
— ViewBase (@viewbasecom) December 25, 2019
There is further speculation that a single whale or even Vitalik Buterin himself could be off loading his stash.
The PlusToken scam ETH dumps have already flooded markets and caused prices to plummet. Now, these transactions could add to avalanche.
For Fork’s Sake
Ethereum FUD is mounting as another hard fork approaches. The timing of the Muir Glacier upgrade is questionable as it falls on New Year’s Day.
The second upgrade in less than a month has raised some eyebrows among the Ethereum hecklers and bitcoin maximalists. Developers and detractors are not happy with having to work over the holiday period to upgrade network nodes and they are venting their angst on crypto twitter.
When I said that Ethereum’s “surprise hard fork” which increases the inflation rate is scheduled to Jan 1st – a holiday! – people said I was wrong so I retracted that. Turned out they were wrong, I was right, and we’re only finding this out a week ahead of time. Great job ETH
When I said that Ethereum’s “surprise hard fork” which increases the inflation rate is scheduled to Jan 1st – a holiday! – people said I was wrong so I retracted that.
Turned out they were wrong, I was right, and we’re only finding this out a week ahead of time. Great job ETH https://t.co/bUTUpwpqjb
— Udi Wertheimer (@udiWertheimer) December 23, 2019
It is a routine upgrade but many have questioned why it was not included in Istanbul. Muir Glacier will delay the difficulty bomb for another 4 million blocks, or approximately 600 days, through EIP 2384.
Others have observed that the developer base could be spreading so thin that more focus on ETH 2.0 is having a negative effect on the current platform.
Buterin himself has proposed changes that could fast track the launch of ETH 2.0 by merging the two together and running the existing chain as a shard of the new one.
For those who haven’t seen it yet, my proposal to merge eth1 into eth2 earlier:https://t.co/68DjAWavLz
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) December 26, 2019
It appears that the wider crypto community has an increasing amount of digital ammo to throw at Ethereum now though the heightened tribalism really does not do much for the industry in general.
Prices are unlikely to recover this year so a further crash could well be possible while Ethereum weathers this storm.
Will ETH prices dump further this week? Add your comments below.
Images via Shutterstock, Twitter @VitalikButerin @viewbasecom @udiwertheimer
The Rundown
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