Cryptocurrency market value tops $2 trillion for the first time as ethereum hits record high

Cryptocurrency market value tops $2 trillion for the first time as ethereum hits record high

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In 2021, bitcoin and ether have seen huge rallies. In April 2021, the cryptocurrency market topped $2 trillion in value for the first time. Jaap Arriens | NurPhoto | Getty Images

GUANGZHOU, China — The value of the cryptocurrency market topped $2 trillion for the first time on Monday driven by a rally in ether, the second-largest digital coin. In just over two months, the market capitalization of the cryptocurrency market has doubled, according to price tracking website CoinGecko, as retail and institutional investors pile into the space. Bitcoin, the biggest digital currency, accounts for over 50% of the entire cryptocurrency market capitalization. Bitcoin has rallied over 100% this year alone, and that has helped drive the cryptocurrency market higher. Last month, bitcoin hit a record high of above $61,000. The digital coin was trading at about $58,800 on Tuesday, according to Coindesk data.

Ether rally

But the latest boost in the cryptocurrency market appears to have been driven by ether, the digital coin that powers the Ethereum blockchain. Bitcoin also runs on a technology called blockchain which is a public ledger of activity and a way for transactions to take place using the cryptocurrency. In comparison, the Ethereum blockchain is more like a software platform that allows developers to build apps on top of it. Users can then spend ether on these apps. So-called smart contracts are a key feature of Ethereum. These are contracts that can be automatically executed using code. There is growing excitement about the use of Ethereum in so-called decentralized finance, or DeFi, applications. These are blockchain-based financial services, such as lending, which could in theory bypass banks and brokerages. Users of these apps may transact using cryptocurrency. Ethereum also has the underlying technology behind the recent craze in non-fungible tokens, or NFTs — a new type of digital asset.

Billionaire investor Mark Cuban owns ether and said that it is the “closest we have to a true currency.” Ether hit an all-time high of $2,151.25 on Tuesday morning Singapore time, according to CoinDesk. It is up over 180% year-to-date. The digital currency is also seeing interest among companies. Chinese app maker Meitu bought $22.1 million worth of ether last month, making it one of the first major companies to do so.

Bitcoin interest

A Memorable March: Bitcoin and Ethereum Adoption Skyrockets

One year later, and March 2021 already seems somewhat better from all standpoints. But, when it comes to the crypto industry, this last month has been one of the most prosperous in the sector’s entire history, especially when it comes to adoption and the prices of Bitcoin and Ethereum.

March 2021 boosts crypto adoption

The past 31 days have brought a lot of progress to the cryptocurrency industry, but it could be said that the adoption has seen the most progress. Institutional investors have been overcoming their fear of cryptocurrency for over a year now, and with each passing month, they have been more and more encouraged to join the crypto sector and help it grow. Companies like Grayscale and MicroStrategy have invested millions into crypto on behalf of their clients, and despite recent dips, institutions continue to invest. Grayscale even launched new crypto products only a few weeks ago.

Major financial institutions like JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley have started offering crypto products, and even the Deutsche Bank openly stated that cryptocurrencies can no longer be ignored.

This last month revealed that Tesla has bought over $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin. This month, however, its CEO, Elon Musk, announced that the electric car company will now start accepting Bitcoin as a means of payment.

Another report revealed that Bitcoin miners managed to earn over $1.5 billion in March of this year alone, making mining one of the most profitable ways of earning Bitcoin at the moment.

And, of course, no one will soon forget that this was a month of Bitcoin ETFs, with as many as three of them emerging in Canada, one of which was launched by Galaxy Digital’s Mike Novogratz. These are the first BTC ETFs in North America, and their very existence has given US companies a new encouragement to continue to bombard the SEC with new ETF applications.

This has also been a major month for Ethereum, as its DeFi sector reached an all-time high at $46.1 billion in total value locked (TVL) in mid-March. Meanwhile, NFTs (non-fungible tokens) became one of the main topics of news and discussions, as tokenization started taking off. There were countless examples of celebrities, groups, and organizations launching NFTs, selling tokenized versions of songs, tweets, watches, and anything else that has any kind of value.

Story continues

Not to mention that Visa embraced crypto settlement, and chose Ethereum blockchain to conduct them on. Lastly, Ethereum continues to slowly implement changes that will eventually result in its transformation into Ethereum 2.0 — a better, faster, more scalable blockchain, with much cheaper transactions and greater functionalities.

Bitcoin and Ethereum hit all-time highs in March 2021

The situation regarding crypto prices was equally as good, at least for a time. Bitcoin managed to hit a new ATH earlier this month, which was followed by a major price correction. The coin reached an ATH of $61,683 on March 13th, only to correct to $54k three days later. It then attempted to reach $60k once again after that, and it succeeded, but the approaching expiration date of $6 million worth of Bitcoin options caused fears of major sell-off, resulting in an even deeper price drop that brought the coin to $51k by March 25th.

Now, only one week later, the coin is nearly back at $60k, surging rapidly over the past week, and currently sitting at $59,781.

Ethereum saw a similar price performance, however it was held back by extremely strong resistance at $1,850 for the majority of the month, and this barrier caused it to trade sideways for weeks. The coin managed to breach it only once in the past month, around the time of Bitcoin’s ATH. However, ETH did not manage to beat its February record. Instead, it only climbed to $1920 before dropping back down.

When Bitcoin options expiration date approached, ETH price was affected too due to BTC dominance, dropping to $1560 as a result. However, just like BTC, Ethereum also recovered over the past six days, and it currently pushes strongly against the resistance at $1850, which is also the coin’s price at the time of writing.

At the moment, both coins are trading in the green, with their prices surging as the new rally took over, and it would not be surprising for new ATHs to be reached in the next day. Historically speaking, crypto industry often performs very well in April and May, so the next two months have an excellent chance of bringing great price performance.

Greg Waisman, the co-founder and COO of the global payment network Mercuryo

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

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Cryptocurrency Market Cap Passes $2 Trillion as Ethereum Prices Reach All-Time High

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

Don’t expect cryptocurrency miners to stop buying up the best graphics cards any time soon. Reuters today reported that the cryptocurrency market cap surpassed $2 trillion, a new record, as the prices for Bitcoin, Ethereum and other coins attract the attention of more investors.

According to Coindesk ,Bitcoin pricing hit a 24-hour high of $59,243 at time of writing. That doesn’t quite match the cryptocurrency’s all-time high price of $61,556 but it was still a 1.21% increase over the previous day and a sign of the coin’s stability.

Bitcoin can maintain a $1 trillion market cap all on its own if its price stays above $53,000, Reuters said. Coindesk’s price info shows that it’s been hovering around that threshold since mid-February and hasn’t dropped below it since March 8.

Bitcoin wasn’t the only coin contributing to this $2 trillion market cap, however. Ethereum reached its all-time highest price of $2,144 on Friday; it’s sitting at $2,106 at time of writing. Other coins have also enjoyed price increases over the last day.

Much of this growth has been attributed to more investors buying into the crypto market. Tesla purchased $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin in February, for example, and trading apps like Robinhood have pushed to make crypto trading more accessible.

These price increases are good news for cryptocurrency miners, but people hoping to upgrade their builds with new graphics cards for gaming might be disappointed that the crypto market will continue to affect GPU supplies. When the best GPUs for mining go out of stock, miners are sure to turn to whatever’s available.

MSI and Asus have already warned that the ongoing GPU shortage will lead to higher graphics cards prices throughout 2021—and that was before reports indicated that water rationing in Taiwan could affect GPU production if conditions don’t improve.

Rumor has it that Nvidia has resorted to increasing production of the outdated GTX 1050 Ti, 1650 and RTX 2060 in an attempt to give manufacturers something they can sell to gamers. But that isn’t much of a consolation when the RTX 30-series exists.

All of which means the crypto market cap passing the $2 trillion mark probably isn’t great news for gamers. For anyone interested in joining the mining frenzy, however, now’s an appropriate time to check out our guides explaining how to mine Ethereum and how to optimize your GPU for mining Ethereum.