Ethereums metrics have recently seen an interesting uptick since loans issued on Ethereum have been increasing throughout the year. Many people are suggesting that this is a result of the anticipation for Ethereum 2.0, which will mark the transition to proof-of-stake.

A recent statistic shown by @defipulseshows that almost $3 million ETH is currently represented as debt. This could be explained as a rush to accumulate at least 32 ETH before the launch of Ethereum 2.0.

Ethereum has been preparing for the Istanbul hard fork, which is scheduled for December of this year. Istanbul represents the latest fork before the transition to Ethereum 2.0 which will likely launch next year.

Cryptocurrency trader @RJ_Killmex stated that November has been the beginning of the upward/downward movement for the Ethereum price in 2017 and 2018, respectively.

The current movement in November 2019 is outlined. Lets take a closer look at price movement and technical indicators to see if we can predict its future movement.

The Ethereum price began an upward move in December 2018. It reached a high of $363 before decreasing to around $157.

Currently, it has found support above the 0.618 Fib level. While it reached values below it several times, it only created long lower wicks before eventually moving upward.

However, every bullish candle has been contained within the body of the massive bearish candle near the end of September. A price close above $220 would be required for the uptrend to be validated.

Looking at the RSI, we can see a strong bullish divergence in the weekly RSI.

Additionally, the weekly MACD has made a bullish cross. The previous time this happened was in December 2018 being a catalyst for the current upward move.

The Ethereum price made a double bottom at $156 on September 21 and October 23, before breaking out above the long-term descending resistance line.

Afterward, it has made a likely bullish pennant and is struggling to break out above the 100-day moving average(MA). If it does, it is likely to confirm the existence of the uptrend and reach new highs.

In this scenario, we would have just finished the second wave and the third wave would likely take us to a high above $500.

Disclaimer: This article is not trading advice and should not be construed as such. Always consult a trained financial professional before investing in cryptocurrencies, as the market is particularly volatile.

Images courtesy of Twitter, TradingView.

Did you know you can trade sign-up to trade Bitcoin and many leading altcoins with a multiplier of up to 100x on a safe and secure exchange with the lowest fees with only an email address? Well, now you do!Click here to get started on StormGain!

Read more here:

Ethereum Uptrend May Begin In November, Analyst Reasons - BeInCrypto

Ethereum (ETH) is closing in on the smallest volatility of all times, show recent trading data. For the past few months, ETH has traded in a tight range, with a relatively predictable price.

Based on Skew analysis, the price of ETH has budged little, with the volatility index at 1.73%.

ETH moved between $180 and $190 in the past weeks. On Thursday, the asset traded at $186.69. The ETH price has barely moved in the past week, despite the relatively large sway in BTC prices. Ethereum is showing signs of decoupling from BTC, as the coin is no longer facing sell-offs, or the bet between BTC and ETH positions.

One of the reasons for ETH stability are the higher trading volumes, currently above $7.7 billion. The share of ETH in terms of overall crypto trading is also rather stable, close to 12% of all activity over the past few months. And while Ethereum is no longer looking ready to attack or flippen BTC, it has become an important fixture in the crypto market.

ETH receives more than $737 million inflows from Tether (USDT), up from around $500 million in the past days. The inflows from the BTC market line up with $462 million. One of the reasons for the stability of ETH is that the new form of ERC-20 USDT is using the Ethereum network, and is among the most active tokens. The share of USDT pairings in the ETH market has crept up to 60%, allowing a separate process of price discovery.

The value of ETH fluctuated wildly during the 2017 bull market, as well as during the ICO craze in 2018. At that time, the prediction for ETH was to remain a utility coin with a value around $400. But Ethereum settled a little under $200, boosted by its new use case in decentralized finance.

At the same time, the Bitcoin volatility index has settled just below 4%, and the leading coin is also stabilizing its price.

The Ethereum network is also running in its usual state, with mining set to continue for more than a year after developers are set to delay the mining ice age once again. The debate about ETH 2.0 for now has not hurt the assets market price.

What do you think about the price action of ETH? Share your thoughts in the comments section below!

Images via Shutterstock, Twitter @skewdotcom

Excerpt from:

Ethereum (ETH) Volatility Nears All-Time Low - Bitcoinist

With Ethereum 2.o expected to roll out by the beginning of 2020, a Simplified Sharding Proposal was recently revealed. The latest sharding proposal has reduced the number of shards from 1,024 to 64. Danny Ryan, a researcher at the Ethereum Foundation recently appeared on a podcast elaborating on the new sharding proposal along with other developments pertaining to Ethereum 2.0.

Ryan pointed out that the reduction in the number of chains in parallel from 1,024 to 64 would cause a decrease in the amount of on-chain computation, however, massive gains could be acquired in terms of data availability. Additionally, he addressed the latest constructions of layer two including an optimistic virtual machine [OVM] and ZK rollup, which relies on data availability. Ryan went on to say,

So coupling the sharding proposal with some of these like very promising constructions that I actually expect to see out next year, we can still have like massive, massive gains and scalability.

While phase zero of Ethereum 2.0 has been scheduled to launch by the beginning of January, Ryan, however, asserted that he has zero expectation that it would roll out in January. But he is positive about phase zero launching in Q1 of 2020. Ryan clarified that a team member threw that date out as a suggestion on a public call, which was swooped up by the media as the launch date.

Ryan added,

It has never been our launch date. Thats what Ive been trying to communicate ever since, that date kind of has become pervasive. But were all targeting a Q1 launch.

Additionally, while talking about the value of the Ethereum, Ryan stated that the current Ethereum community and protocol are incredibly valuable and powerful and Ethereum 2.0 would enhance the growing community. He went on to suggest that Ethereum 2.0 would be the next phase of that evolution and he asserted that he was bullish about Ethereum but he refrained from commenting on the token.

See the rest here:

Ethereum 2.0s Phase Zero to rollout in Q1 of 2020 - AMBCrypto

Ethereum (ETH) based trading card game Gods Unchained has far outstripped CryptoKitties by volume after a censorship scandal involving game-developer Blizzard.

As blockchain research platform Coin Metrics noted on Nov. 12, the past month has seen activity explode for the game, with interest dwarfing that of CryptoKitties at its 2017 peak.

In terms of daily transfers of its non-fungible tokens (NFTs), Gods Unchained was recording almost 500,000 such transfers per day at the end of last week.

By contrast, even at the height of the CryptoKitties craze in late 2017, transfers there totaled less than 100,000.

The data underscores the backlash against Blizzard, the developer behind titles such as World of Warcraft, which last month became embroiled in a PR disaster involving China.

As Cointelegraph reported, the company rescinded prize money from the top player of its Hearthstone game, Chung Ng Wai (aka Blitzchung), after the latter voiced support for the Hong Kong protest movement.

Gods Unchained capitalized on the event, offering replacement winnings and other perks to Chung in a tweet which has now received over 33,000 retweets.

As Coin Metrics notes, like Hearthstone, CryptoKitties players had considerably less control of their assets due to centralization.

...Unlike Hearthstone, Gods Unchained is built on the Ethereum blockchain, and each one of its cards is represented by an ERC-721 token. This means that users truly own their cards and can trade them freely on the open market, similar to any other cryptocurrency, it summarizes.

Somewhat ironically, Chinese authorities themselves subsequently went public with an endorsement of blockchain technology.

At the end of last month, a raft of headlines emerged, among which was advice not to speak badly of blockchain or mistake the support for a shift in policy regarding cryptocurrencies.

Read the original here:

Ethereums Hearthstone Rival Sets Volume Record After Blizzard Scandal - Cointelegraph

Bitcoin developer, known as Udi Wertheimer, recently announced his predictions for the future of Ethereum and Tron, stating his opinion that TRON will overcome Ethereum in about a year or so.

Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap, and has been one of the most important crypto projects to ever be invented. It brought about the era of second generation blockchains, created the first ecosystem of decentralized applications (DApp), and became the first functional smart contracts platform.

However, along the way, Ethereum saw a number of competitors emerge, and while most of them disappeared as years went by, some did stick around. TRON is today one of the projects main competitors, and according to Bitcoin developer, Udi Wertheimer, TRON might even flip Ethereum sometime in 2020.

Naturally, this seems like a rather bold claim at first. However, Wertheimer came up with this prediction after listening to TRON CEO and founder, Justin Sun, discuss the new partnership between TRON and Poloniex.

Sun has mentioned many plans for the partnership between his project and the exchange, such as listings of additional assets, and more. However, he also stated that some additional partnerships which he is not able to discuss just yet would come in the near future, as well.

Wertheimer also states that TRON boasts faster development, better censorship resistance and greater transactions, than the largest altcoin.

Justin Sun is quite well-known for his major announcements and raising hype, which is why many have taken his statements and plans with a grain of salt. In addition, a lot of people do not think much of Poloniex anymore, after the incident from over half a year ago, when Poloniex supposedly took 1800 BTC from its customers and did not pay them back, as some were complaining.

Others also noted that the exchange is not addressing their issues and that it is not to be trusted, which also implies that its partnership with TRON is equally untrustworthy.

Meanwhile, Sun addressed his followers, encouraging them to use Poloniex and help the exchange expand its business. He praises it as the first exchange that allowed the crypto community to buy coins like ETH or TRX, which is partially a reason why it has his support.

As for the future, Sun has announced that Poloniex will start offering more TRC-10 and TRC-20 coins listed, announcing big things to come. Plans like these are what makes Wertheimer believe that TRON will overcome Ethereum in the next year.

What do you think about the predictions favoring TRON over Ethereum? Do you agree with Wertheimer? Let us know in the comments below.

Image via Shutterstock: Twitter @UDIWERTHEIMER @nejelnejel @spacecitychan

See the original post here:

TRON Will Flip Ethereum Next Year, Udi Wertheimer Calls - Bitcoinist

The so-called Ethereum killers never arrived. The network thrives as ERC-20 tokens approach Ethereums capitalization. Other smart contract platforms are not even close to Ethereum in terms of relative activity.

Coin Metrics employed an analysis developed by Chris Burniske of Placeholder, a New York-based venture capital partnership, to measure the health of the Ethereum network. The metric compares the market capitalization of Ether to that of all the tokens launched on the network. This network value to token value ratio evaluates the health of Ethereums token ecosystem.

A value of one indicates that Ethers market cap and the aggregated market capitalization of the tokens it hosts are equivalent. That implies a healthy, possibly undervalued smart contract platform. Coin Metrics found that the ratio has declined significantly since Q2 2017 from just under 35 to 1.9.

Courtesy Coin Metrics Network Data Pro, Ethereum Network Value to Token Value

ERC-20 tokens blossomed during the ICO frenzy of 2017. Most of those were utility tokens that enjoyed explosive initial price growth before rapidly descending though Ether followed a similar trajectory. ICOs generally accepted ETH or BTC in return for their tokens, placing demand pressure on the platforms native token.

Ether went through the same crypto winter endured by the whole market perhaps exacerbated by ICO projects selling out of Ether into fiat to fund their activities.

According to Coin Metrics, stablecoins were responsible for the majority of the growth in non-native token value since mid-2018. Their capitalization rose from $109 million to more than $2.8 billion in that year-and-a-half period going from one to 28 percent of the entire ERC-20 ecosystem.

In contrast, utility tokens fell by almost $2 billion, from 70 to less than 50 percent of the ERC-20 market capitalization. Exchange tokens remained fairly steady, representing about a quarter of the value of ERC-20 tokens.

Courtesy Coin Metrics Network Data Pro, Ethereum Network Value to Token Value

(The sudden plunge in exchange tokens in 2019 is explained by Binance switching BNB to its own mainnet.)

The growing health of Ethereum-hosted tokens only paints half the picture. Since mid-2018, stablecoin growth and a dwindling ETH price have combined to lower the relative value ratio to where it currently stands. On Jul. 1, 2018, Ethers capitalization was just under $50 billion. Now it is around $20 billion.

Courtesy CoinMarketCap, Ether capitalization July 1, 2018 to Nov. 13, 2019

The ERC-20 market essentially remained stable. Its makeup swayed with the growing relative importance of stablecoins, but its total value of approximately $10 billion increased only slightly over the period.

According to Coinmarketcap, Tether remains the dominant stablecoin at a market capitalization of over $4 billion. That is ten times the market cap of the second-largest ERC-20 stablecoin, USDC.

Tether could propel an even lower network value to token value ratio. Tether is built on a number of protocols. The most important are Omni and Ethereum. As Coin Metrics noted, Over the last several months, usage has been shifting from the Omni-based version to the Ethereum-based version of Tether. If that trend continues, Tether will play an increasingly significant role in the aggregate value of the tokens hosted by the Ethereum platform.

Burniske compared the network-to-token value ratios of ETH, EOS, XLM, WAVES, and NEO.

Courtesy Chris Burniske, Placeholder, Comparative Network Value to Token Value ratios

He found that activity on the Ethereum, WAVES, and NEO platforms was quite healthy with ratios under 10. On the other hand, EOS has a ratio of more than 200 far higher than Ethereum. Burniske suggested that at least one of the assets is priced inadequately compared to its token hosting utility:

The graph illustrates that despite its own ups and downs, the Ethereum network remains a healthy platform for token activity. Crypto investors would be wise to stay alert to this metric. At current prices, Ether could be significantly undervalued.

Link:

The Ethereum Token Ecosystem Is Thriving - Crypto Briefing

he plaBy now, you should almost certainly know about Ethereum, ETH the second largest cryptocurrency by market cap. But if you needed a quick recap, here it is.

Ethereums creators wanted to build a platform that would allow users all over the world to write decentralized applications, and use the Ethereum blockchain as a world computer.

The decentralized platform made smart contracts a key part of the blockchain conversation, and demonstrated to the world how blockchain technology can be used for more than just cryptocurrency.

It sounds great, but bringing the Ethereum vision to life is proving difficult for its community of supporters and developers.

One of the most contentious topics of the moment for the platform and one of its creators, Vitalik Buterin, is the transition to ETH 2.0. The series of updates and improvements designed to make the Ethereum platform faster and more reliable will not be implemented overnight. Its going to be a long process, thats due to commence next year, but wont be complete for many more months.

One of Ethereums founding members, Joseph Lubin, has said that the updates should make Ethereum far more scalable within the next 24 months. But of course, a lot has to fall into place for that fact to be realized.

Before we take a look at how Ethereum has performed in the third quarter of the year, lets remind ourselves how things went down in Q2.

In terms of trading price, Ethereum had a solid second quarter.

At the start of April,Ethereumexperienced a rally which saw its price increase by 27 percent from $139 to $177. Unfortunately, this uptick in price was short-lived by the end of April a market correction pulledEthereums trading price down to $150.

Thankfully, the correction didnt have a lasting effect on Ethereum, and over the course of May the digital coin showed nothing but steady growth. Over the four weeks of May, ETHs price increased a whopping 95 percent, topping out at just over $271 per coin.

Over the final month of Q2,Ethereumcontinued to grow. It didnt show the same pace it had shown a month earlier, but by the end of June,Ethereumwas up on where it was at the start of the month. As it happened,Ethereumreached its quarterly high trading price ($335) in June.

Over the course of the quarter, Ethereums trading price rose 114 percent. Not too shabby if youre holding on to ETH tokens for the long run.

Despite having a stellar Q2 and ending the previous quarter on a high, the same cannot be said for the digital coins Q3 performance.

From the first day of the quarter Ethereums price has proceeded on a steady downward trajectory.

Ethereumopened Q3 trading at around $285. The coin held steady around this price during the first week of the quarter. It even saw a 7.7 percent increase on July 8 as itsprice rose to $307 per token.

Unfortunately, that would be as good as it got for Ethereum at the start of Q3. By the third week of July its price started tumbling, a trend seen across a host of other cryptocurrencies and digital tokens.

By July 16, Ethereum hit $202, the lowest trading price for the whole month. This is a painful 34-percent drop over the high it saw in the first week of the month.

The cryptocurrency showed no signs of rallying to better things as it progressed into the middle of Q3. Over the entire month of August, ETH continued to drop in value.

There was a small uptick in trading price at the start of the month which saw Ethereums price grow from $211 to around $231, a 9.5-percent increase.

However, the decentralized token went into free fall for the rest of month.

At the end of August,ETH was trading for $166 per coin, a 28-percent drop from the high it saw at the start of month. Thinking back to the $307 quarterly high seen in July, at the end of Augustthe token had decreased by 46 percent in price.

Despite a slow and steady price rally over the first two weeks of September, the last month of the quarter proved to be just as cruel a mistress as the first two.

Ethereumopened September trading at a hair over $168. Over the next two and a half weeks, its price grew steadily eventually reaching $217, a 30 percent increase.

Unfortunately, the coins price didnt continue to grow or make up for its poor performance at the start of the quarter. The 30 percent increase seen in the middle of the month was erased almost immediately as Ethereums price dropped on September 20, it eventually settled at $162 a few days later.

Perhaps Ethereums sub-par performance in Q3 was a result of the lack of positive news for Buterins baby.

In August, Vitalik Buterin warned the community that his blockchain was almost full, and that a lack of scalability is proving to be a consistent bottleneck. Ultimately, it seems that keeping organizations from joining the network, isnt good for adoption.

Whats more, research from cloud service provider Chainstack showed that over half of Ethereum nodes are running on cloud computing services, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Thats incredibly shaky news for a platform that positions itself as decentralized. If that wasnt bad enough, in early September Ethereum overtook Bitcoin in terms of daily fees. Perhaps a sign that Ethereum is struggling to deal with the volume of users.

That said, its not all bad news for the so-called world computer. Dapp developers still love Ethereum, even if it is lagging behind in active users, according to Dapp Radar.

There was also some good news for traders, as eToro announced the addition of five Ethereum-based tokens to its professional trading platform, eToro X. It also said it has plans to add a further 115 in the future.

The start of Q4 is already looking more positive forEthereum within the first two weeks of OctoberEthereums price reached $195.

A small market correction saw Ethereums price drop back down to trade between $160 and $180 for the following week.

The future ofButerins platformhangs in the balance, though. News that itsblockchainis struggling to deal with demands on its resources means the future looks uncertain at best.

According to a CoinDesk report published in Q3, Ethereum is facing challenges on all fronts. It doesnt just have to address its scalability woes, it also has to consider its future as money.

However, investors dont seem to be immediately worried about Ethereums short term future. It seems Buterin and co have doing enough to keep traders interested, for now.

With every passing week, we get closer to the planned launch of ETH 2.0. How that affects the long term functionality of the platform though, remains to be seen. But it might be time to grab the popcorn, because Q4 2019 and Q1 2020 are going to be interesting.

This post is brought to you by eToro. eToro is a multi-asset platform which offers both investing in stocks and cryptocurrencies, as well as trading CFD assets.

Please note that CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 65% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work, and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Cryptocurrencies can fluctuate widely in price and are, therefore, not appropriate for all investors. Trading cryptocurrencies is not supervised by any EU regulatory framework.

Past performance is not an indication of future results. This is not investment advice. Your capital is at risk.

Published October 23, 2019 06:43 UTC

Read more from the original source:

Ethereum had a less than stellar Q3, intense 6 months ahead as ETH 2.0 looms - The Next Web

Ethereum

Ethereum tumbled by 5.12% on Wednesday. Following on from a 1.75% decline on Tuesday, Ethereum ended the day at $162.49.

A bearish start to the day saw Ethereum fall from an early morning high $171.48 to an early morning low $164.10.

Steering clear of the major resistance levels, Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $169.38 and second major support level at $167.46.

Finding support late in the morning, Ethereum recovered to $167.6 levels before sliding to a late afternoon intraday low $153.0.

The broad-based mid-day crypto sell-off saw Ethereum slide back through the second major support level at $167.46 and third major support level at $162.53.

Through the late part of the day, a late jump to an intraday high $174.05 was short-lived, with Ethereum sliding back through the major support levels to wrap up the day at $162 levels.

The extended bearish trend, formed at late April 2018s swing hi $828.97, remained firmly intact. A reversal from Junes current year high $364.49 back through the 23.6% FIB of $257 reaffirmed the extended bearish trend.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was down by 0.76% to $161.26. A bearish start to the day saw Ethereum fall from an early morning high $162.88 to a low $159.01 before finding support.

Ethereum left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Ethereum would need to move back through to $162.40 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $171.65.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ethereum to break through to $170 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, Ethereum would likely face plenty of resistance at $170 to limit any upside.

Failure to move back through to $162.40 levels could see Ethereum slide deeper into the red.

A fall back through the morning low $159.01 would bring the first major support level at $153.17 into play.

Barring an extended sell-off through the day, Ethereum should steer clear of sub-$150 support levels.

Major Support Level: $153.17

Major Resistance Level: $171.65

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Stellars Lumen slid by 5.77% on Wednesday. Reversing a 1.43% decline on Tuesday, with interest, Stellars Lumen ended the day at $0.059699.

A bullish start to the day saw Stellars Lumen rise to an early morning intraday high $0.06352 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the major resistance levels, Stellars Lumen fell back to a mid-morning low $0.06153.

Stellars Lumen fell through the first major support level at $0.0625 before recovering to $0.06280 levels.

The recovery was short-lived, however, with Stellars Lumen tumbling to a late afternoon intraday low $0.057155.

Stellars Lumen fell through the major support levels before finding support to move back through to $0.0597 levels.

In spite of the late support, the third major support level at $0.05960 pegged Stellars Lumen back at the end of the day.

The extended bearish trend remained firmly intact, reaffirmed by 24th Septembers new swing lo $0.051614. Stellars Lumen continued to fall short of the 23.6% FIB of $0.1310 following a pullback from $0.13 levels in late June.

At the time of writing, Stellars Lumen was down by 0.7% to $0.05928. A bearish start to the day saw Stellars Lumen fall from an early morning high $0.05983 to a low $0.0590.

Story continues

Stellars Lumen left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Stellars Lumen would need to break through to $0.0600 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $0.0631.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Stellars Lumen to break through to $0.06100 levels.

In the event of a broad-based crypto rebound, the first major resistance level at $0.0631 and Wednesday high $0.06352 would likely limit any upside.

Failure to move through to $0.0600 levels could see Stellars Lumen slide deeper into the red.

A fall back through the morning low $0.05900 would bring the first major support level at $0.0567 into play.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, Stellars Lumen should steer clear of sub-$0.05600 levels.

Major Support Level: $0.0567

Major Resistance Level: $0.0631

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.1114

38% FIB Retracement Level: $0.1484

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.2082

Please let us know what you think in the comments below.

Thanks, Bob

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

Read more here:

Ethereum and Stellars Lumen Daily Tech Analysis 24/10/19 - Yahoo Finance

Adam Back, co-founder and chief executive officer of Blockstream Corp., speaks at the Group of 20 ... [+] high-level seminar on financial innovation "Our Future in the Digital Age" on the sidelines of the G20 finance ministers and central bank governors meeting in Fukuoka on June 8, 2019. (Photo by Kiyoshi Ota / POOL / AFP) (Photo credit should read KIYOSHI OTA/AFP/Getty Images)

Tomorrow (a few hours from now), it will have been exactly five years since the original white paper on Bitcoin sidechains (PDF) was released. The basic idea explained in the paper was that Bitcoin users would be allowed to move their coins between multiple, completely different blockchains that could enable a wide range of new cryptocurrency features.

The end result of this functionality would theoretically be an end to the many altcoins that existed on the market at the time, as there would no longer be a legitimate reason to create a new cryptocurrency in an effort to experiment with new features. Instead, new features that were sufficiently complex could come to Bitcoin by way of sidechains.

Today, sidechains do exist, but they come with trade-offs in the areas of centralization and censorship resistance at least for now. At the recent Transylvania Crypto Conference, a panel of experts on the topic, including Blockstream CEO and sidechains white paper co-author Adam Back, discussed the current state and future potential of sidechains for Bitcoin.

The End of Altcoins?

Despite the hype around Bitcoin sidechains, altcoins still very much exist. In fact, Ethereum briefly surpassed Bitcoin in terms of transaction fees collected by miners per day around the start of October (although that may not mean much for the ETH price).

That said, Back is still bullish on the idea that sidechains will eventually diminish the attractiveness of alternative cryptocurrencies.

In the history of altcoins, it seemed like there was a period where there were a huge number of them that had no features, said Back at the Transylvania Crypto Conference. And that played out. And then people started to need a new way to market them, so they added features. Some of them were real features, and some of them were stories to market [their altcoins].

Back added that making Bitcoin more modular could allow developers to more easily bring new features to the peer-to-peer digital cash system, but there is a problem with incentives when it comes to altcoins versus sidechains. Those who are motivated by money are incentivized to create an altcoin rather than simply innovate on Bitcoin.

This financial incentive will remain, but it will have less credibility because if you have a very easy to use extension mechanism for Bitcoin and examples of extensions that do something simple that you can build on, theres not really a good story about why youre doing it somewhere else, explained Back.

In Backs view, the development of the internet would have been as distracted, disorganized, and confused as the evolution of Bitcoin if everybody was making forked copies of TCP/IP with slight tweaks rather than simply pushing forward with one unified protocol stack.

Back also added that sidechains arent the only solution here. This concept of building on Bitcoin and weakening the viability of altcoins can be applied to layer-two protocols built on top of Bitcoin more generally. In the past, many have argued that Bitcoins Lightning Network makes altcoins focused on fast, cheap payments look rather pointless.

Making Better Sidechains

The versions of sidechains that exist today arent exactly trustless. Blockstreams Liquid sidechain puts control of the funds on the sidechain into the hands of a federation of Bitcoin exchanges, traders, and other financial institutions. An alternative system known as Drivechain, which has been developed by Bitcoin researcher Paul Sztorc, would put miners in control of the funds on the sidechain, but enabling this type of sidechain would require a soft-forking change to Bitcoin.

Your risk with Bitcoin is that, ultimately, the coins are escrowed in some way in a somewhat decentralized way, Back explained at the Transylvania Crypto Conference. If its merged mined, the miners, collectively, could take them against the protocol, or if its in some kind of HSM-assured multisig, somebody could go hack two-thirds of the HSMs.

Of course, these trade-offs are often viewed as acceptable, especially when the vast majority of Bitcoin's competitors seem to miss the point of why Bitcoin was created in the first place.

At a developer meetup last year, Blockstream Mathematician Andrew Poelstra stated that, in his view, the high degree of centralization in the Bitcoin mining industry made some previously-envisioned forms of sidechains untenable. However, Poelstra is also of the belief that zero-knowledge proofs may eventually be the way forward for this technology.

Back touched on zero-knowledge proofs during his appearance at the Transylvania Crypto Conference, although he indicated this technology may be some years off from being ready for use in sidechains.

Thats an enormous proof, and all of the current proof systems are orders of magnitude away from being able to do that, and some of them make experimental security assumptions, said Back. Maybe the bulletproof-like security and scalability will improve enough, and then we can make general, fully-secure sidechains just by having the main chain block verify a list of them. That would be very nice.

The Blockstream CEO also covered the potential of so-called extension blocks, which Back brought up as a potential solution during Bitcoins massive block size debate back in 2015. Specifically, Back noted this option could allow users to opt into advanced privacy features; however, he added that there are also serious risks, such as the potential for an accidental chain fork, associated with adding experimental cryptography to Bitcoin in this way.

In the past, extension blocks have also been criticized as effective block size increases, but Back said this drawback can be avoided by implementing a unified limit for the extension block and Bitcoins main blockchain.

Finally, Back also mentioned Blockstreams Simplicity programming language as potentially useful for the deployment of sidechains on Bitcoin.

With that, you have enough guarantees of determinism that you could implement the sidechain rules in Simplicity and verify it in Bitcoin and be pretty sure that its not going to diverge, said Back. But, youve still got the size argument.

While trustless sidechains on Bitcoin may still be quite a few years away, there are other layer-two protocols, such as federated sidechains and the Lightning Network, that allow Bitcoin to gain the features of the most popular altcoins right now albeit usually with security trade-offs. These additional protocol layers will likely become relatively trustless eventually, as advancements in cryptography are made over time.

See the article here:

When Will Bitcoin Sidechains Send Ethereum, Ripple, And Other Crypto Prices To Zero? - Forbes

Fuel Labs has unveiled Fuel, an alternative scaling solution for Ethereum, the second largest blockchain platform, in a blog post yesterday. The project is expected to go live on mainnet soon, following security audits to make sure its safe.

Fuel Labs is a non-profit organization built by a small group of Ethereum programmers. For the past two months, its been quietly working on Fuel, which is largely based on a research paper by ConsenSys researcher John Adler (ConsenSys funds an editorially independent Decrypt).

The blog post states, After a few in-depth conversations, we began working hard to put together a realistic Ethereum scaling implementation that could solve a single problem: sustainably scalable, cheap, and reliable stablecoin payments on Ethereum: Fuel.

The teams own conservative estimates claim that Fuel could make Ethereum transaction five times cheaper. On top of this, it estimates that it could increase the number of transactions that Ethereum can handle per second from around 10 to 50. Looking ahead, it sees that number rising to 2000 transactions per second (TPS)or even up to one million.

Ethereum is a platform for handling lots of cryptocurrency payments, including thousands of tokens and decentralized apps (dapps) built on top of it. But its currently struggling to handle the huge amount of transactions. There have been many proposed solutions so far, such as off-chain network Plasma, but none has proven truly effective yet. Fuel Labs is planning on using a new technology called optimistic rollupswhich Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has been discussing recentlyto build a solution that, it claims, will better help Ethereum to scale immediately, resulting in much cheaper transactions.

Optimistic rollups build on the notion of sidechains, where work is offloaded to a parallel blockchain. But these dont fully solve the problem, since they still involve making a lot of transactions on the main Ethereum blockchain.

Instead, optimistic rollups make very few transactions on the main blockchain by essentially batching transactions together. In this case, the data is still available on the main Ethereum blockchain but its hidden deep down in data structures known as merkle trees. However, its possible to find the data, as long as you know where to look.

That means you can still prove the optimistic rollup transactions are accurate because you can look up any of the transactions on the main Ethereum blockchaintaking the weight off Ethereums shoulders while still making use of its high level of security.

Taking Ethereum mainstream: Social media app Pepo goes live at Devcon 5

This plan should help it to achieve the more conservative TPS estimates. To reach the higher TPS figures, Fuel will require some changes to the Ethereum blockchain. But if Fuel Labs shows it can deliver, Ethereum developers might be inclined to make Ethereum support this technology. (Similarly, for Bitcoin, developers are making updates to the Bitcoin blockchain to support its own scaling solution, Lightning).

Fuel could also help Ethereum to support stablecoins more efficiently. For example, Tether has been rapidly filling up the network in recent weeks as more Ethereum-based Tether has been issued. This led to so many transactions, Buterin claimed that the Ethereum blockchain was almost full. In response, Ethereum miners increased block sizes, to allow more transactions to go through. But this is only a temporary measureit makes the blockchain harder to maintain.

Fuel Labs thinks that the Ethereum blockchain will benefit if it can provide for stablecoins, without breaking at the seams. If it can do so, the blog post states, this could add tremendous value to the global economy with far reaching implications.

Read the original here:

Fuel Labs has a plan to scale Ethereum today, and its almost ready - Yahoo Finance

Ethereum price is slowly climbing higher versus the US Dollar, while bitcoin is up 5%. However, ETH price is likely to face a strong resistance near the $180 area.

This past week, Ethereum tested the $168 and $170 support levels on two occasions against the US Dollar. However, the bears were not able to gain strength below $168. As a result, there was a short term upside correction above the $172 resistance. More importantly, bitcoin rallied more than 5% and climbed above the key $8,200 resistance area.

During the rise, ETH price even broke the $175 resistance and the 100 hourly simple moving average. Moreover, there was a break above a key bearish trend line with resistance near $172 on the hourly chart of ETH/USD. The pair tested the $177-178 area and it is currently consolidating gains. It is trading near the 23.6% Fib retracement level of the recent recovery from the $169 low to $176 high.

Additionally, it seems like the $175 level and the 100 hourly SMA are acting as supports. If there are more downsides, Ethereum price could test the $172 support area. Moreover, the 50% Fib retracement level of the recent recovery from the $169 low to $176 high is also near the $172 area to act as a major support. Any further losses could push the price back towards the key $168 support area.

On the upside, there are many important hurdles near the $178 and $180 levels. To move into a positive zone, the price has to move above the $180 resistance. The next key resistance is near the $185 level, above which ETH could start a solid upward move.

Looking at the chart, Ethereum price is clearly recovering and it is showing positive signs above $175. However, the price is likely to fail near the $180 or $185 resistance area. On the downside, the $168 level holds the key, below which the price could decline towards the $162 and $160 support levels in the near term.

Hourly MACD The MACD for ETH/USD is about to move into the bearish zone.

Hourly RSI The RSI for ETH/USD is currently well above the 50 level.

Major Support Level $172

Major Resistance Level $180

Continued here:

Ethereum (ETH) Could Recover To $180, Bitcoin Up 5% - newsBTC

The Ethereum community is hard at work on Ethereum 2.0, the next major upgrade of its blockchain. It is an incredibly challenging task, and the Ethereum Foundation has been completely transparent about its road map and progress. Thats why Im excited to announce that Ethereum Foundation researcher Justin Drake is joining us at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

Justin Drake will give us an update on Ethereum 2.0. Hes been working on sharding and scalability in order to better support the Ethereum ecosystem and enable new use cases.

The current version of Ethereum can only handle a dozen transactions per second. With sharding, the computing load will be partitioned, which should lead to a drastic increase in performance.

And the most fascinating part of Ethereum 2.0 is that its a moving target. The Ethereum community has put years of research and development in the update in order to refine how its going to work and how its going to be rolled out. Its a large-scale experiment of distributed development.

Ethereum 2.0 will be rolled out in multiple phases in order to ensure the finality of a transaction, construct shard chains and make sure smart contracts run properly. If that sounds complicated, Justin Drake can tell you in simple words why Ethereum is such an interesting project.

Ethereum 2.0 could transform the Ethereum blockchain into a sort of world computer that can execute instructions across a network of servers all around the world. And thats what so exciting about it.

And thats not all. In addition to an interview on Ethereum, Justin Drake will also talk about building a blockchain startup on the Extra Crunch Stage with other blockchain experts.

He knows how important it is to build a community of developers and researchers around your blockchain project. And he can tell you about the best strategies to communicate and iterate on complicated blockchain projects.

Buy your ticket to Disrupt Berlin to listen to those discussions and many others. The conference will take place December 11-12.

In addition to panels and fireside chats, like this one, new startups will participate in the Startup Battlefield to compete for the highly coveted Battlefield Cup.

Justin lives in Cambridge, UK where he studied mathematics. He founded the Cambridge Bitcoin Meetup group in 2013, and in 2014 left his job as a programmer and FPGA engineer to study the blockchain space. In 2015 he operated a Bitcoin ATM and started a company providing a web interface for OpenBazaar. He is now a researcher for the Ethereum Foundation focusing on sharding.

Go here to see the original:

Justin Drake from the Ethereum Foundation is coming to Disrupt Berlin - TechCrunch

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is confident that Ethereum futures are likely to arrive in 2020. This could be good timing if altseason fails to materialize in the next few months and Ethereum prices remain low.

At a fireside chat during the first day of DC Fintech Week, CFTC Chairman Heath Tarbert said he absolutely believes Ethereum futures could trade in the next 6 to 12 months.

The volume to which itll trade, no idea, thats where the markets decide, but my guess is now that weve provided at least a little bit more clarity on [ethers eligibility for futures contracts], my guess is market participants will consider that.

He continued to state that there have been no official applications by firms willing to launch Ethereum futures contracts. Considering the current regulatory atmosphere in the US though that is hardly surprising. At the moment four contenders could emerge and they are likely to be Seed CX, ErisX, Tassat and LedgerX.

So far there has been no response from CME or CBOE as to whether they will be offering Ether base futures. A CME spokesperson told Coindesk that they are focused on bringing options on CME Bitcoin futures to market in Q1 2020 and continuing to grow their CME CF Reference Rates and Real-Time Indices.

Tarbert continued adding that a CFTC regulated exchange would provide investor confidence for Ethereum products in that there would be no market manipulation. When asked about other crypto assets he added that there will be other derivatives coming soon to a market near you, but failed to specify further details or time frames.

Ethereum is still way down from its peak whereas Bitcoin was approaching its all-time high when futures were first launched. In mid-December 2017 BTC prices were hitting their ATH of a shade under $20,000.

Two futures products offering the opportunity to short the asset for the first time were launched and prices predictably dumped. Industry observers have not let this go unnoticed;

Bitcoin futures launched at the EXACT pinnacle of the bull market, a huge investment vehicle for those looking to short the market as it was clearly overpriced.

ETH is in no way overpriced at the moment and the markets are not overbought. It is down around 87.5% from its peak and still deep in the middle of a two year bear market.

Work on ETH 2.0 is already underway though the complete roll out could be at least another year away. Istanbul will address the preliminary issues while initial phases of Serenity will begin early next year in the form of beacon chain.

A coincidental futures launch as developers solve some of the problematic scaling issues could result in a very bullish 2020 for Ethereum.

Image from Shutterstock

Go here to read the rest:

Why Bear Market Ethereum Futures Are a Better Bet That Bitcoins - newsBTC

Ethereum

Ethereum fell by 1.75% on Tuesday. Following on from a 0.64% decline on Monday, Ethereum ended the day at $171.3.

A relatively bullish start to the day saw Ethereum rise to an early morning intraday high $175.4 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $177.76, Ethereum slid to a late intraday low $170.47.

The sell-off saw Ethereum fall through the first major support level at $171.21 before finding support.

Finding support at the day end, Ethereum managed to break back through the first major support level.

The extended bearish trend, formed at late April 2018s swing hi $828.97, remained firmly intact. A reversal from Junes current year high $364.49 back through the 23.6% FIB of $257 reaffirmed the extended bearish trend.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was down by 2.53% to $166.96. A particularly bearish start to the day saw Ethereum fall from an early morning high $171.48 to a low $164.10.

Falling short of the major resistance levels, Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $169.38 and second major support level at $167.46.

Ethereum would need to move back through to $172.40 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $174.31.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ethereum to move back through the major support levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, Ethereum would likely fail to recover to $170 levels later in the day. The first major support level at $169.38 would likely pin Ethereum back.

Failure to move back through the major support levels could see Ethereum test the third major support level at $162.53.

Barring an extended sell-off through the day, however, Ethereum should steer clear of sub-$160 levels.

Major Support Level: $169.38

Major Resistance Level: $174.31

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Stellars Lumen fell by 1.43% on Tuesday. Partially reversing a 1.65% rise from Monday, Stellars Lumen ended the day at $0.063335.

A choppy start to the day saw Stellars Lumen rise to an early morning intraday high $0.064999 before sliding to a mid-morning low $0.064015.

Stellars Lumen broke through the first major resistance level at $0.0647 before hitting reverse.

Steering clear of the major support levels, Stellars Lumen broke back through the first major resistance level before succumbing to market forces.

A late sell-off saw Stellars Lumen slide through the first major support level at $0.06320 to an intraday low $0.062926.

Finding support from the broader market, Stellars Lumen recovered to $0.063 levels to limit the downside on the day.

The extended bearish trend remained firmly intact, reaffirmed by 24th Septembers new swing lo $0.051614. Stellars Lumen continued to fall short of the 23.6% FIB of $0.1310 following a pullback from $0.13 levels in late June.

At the time of writing, Stellars Lumen was down by 1.61% to $0.062313. A bearish start to the day saw Stellars Lumen slide from an early morning high $0.06352 to a low $0.062313.

Falling short of the major resistance levels, Stellars Lumen fell through the first major support level at $0.06250.

Story continues

Stellars Lumen would need to break through the first major support level to $0.06380 levels to support a run at $0.064 levels.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Stellars Lumen to take a run at the first major resistance level at $0.06460.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, Stellars Lumen would likely come up short of $0.0630 levels, however.

Failure to break through the first major support level could see Stellars Lumen slide deeper into the red.

A fall through to $0.06210 levels would bring the second major support level at $0.06170 into play before any recovery.

Barring an extended sell-off through the day, however, Stellars Lumen should steer clear of sub-$0.060 support levels.

Major Support Level: $0.06250

Major Resistance Level: $0.06460

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.1114

38% FIB Retracement Level: $0.1484

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.2082

Please let us know what you think in the comments below.

Thanks, Bob

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

Excerpt from:

Ethereum and Stellars Lumen Daily Tech Analysis 23/10/19 - Yahoo Finance

The United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) hasnt come to bury Ether, its come to regulate it. That was the message drawn from Heath Tarberts remarks from the stage at Yahoo Finances All Markets Summit in New York City on Oct. 10, which could have important consequences for the crypto and blockchain industry. He went on:

It is my view as Chairman of the CFTC that Ether is a commodity, and therefore it will be regulated under the CEA. And my guess is that you will see in the near future Ether-related futures contracts and other derivatives potentially traded.

Ether (ETH) the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum ecosystem is a public, open-source blockchain-based platform that features smart contracts. As a commodity, Ether would be regulated in the U.S. by the CFTC; if it were found to be an investment, by contrast, it would be regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Hence the importance of a definition, whereby Bitcoin (BTC) is also a commodity in the view of U.S. regulators, its futures contracts have been traded since December 2017. Perianne Boring, CEO of the Chamber of Digital Commerce, told Cointelegraph that the chairmans pronouncement was incredibly important, adding:

The hint from Chairman Tarbert that ETH derivatives may be introduced soon are a sign of market maturity, and an encouraging step forward in recognizing the benefits of digital assets in this country.

It may be too early to gauge when the first Ether futures product will go to market. At this time, CME Group has no plans to introduce additional cryptocurrency futures, including Ether futures, a spokesperson for the owner of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) the largest player in the Bitcoin futures market told Cointelegraph, adding:

Right now, we are focused on bringing options on CME bitcoin futures to market in Q1 2020.

More futures trading tools could help the crypto industry attract institutional investors like mutual funds and hedge funds. Funds typically have investment constraints that allow them to only invest in specific assets for their portfolio, and this has inhibited them from investing in digital assets. But when a crypto futures contract is settled, investors are paid in U.S. dollars, not in BTC or ETH, which could make a difference.

Related: Are Trading Vehicles Dragging Crypto Into Maturity?

Mainstream investors, too, have avoided Bitcoin and Ether because of storage problems. If investors lose their private key, they lose their Bitcoin. Furthermore, custodians and brokers are now available that can take care of investing and storing, but fees for such services are often high. By investing in futures contracts, participants can bet for or against the price of the cryptocurrency without having to actually own or store it.

There is still not a lot of institutional interest in crypto, Lanre Sarumi, CEO of crypto asset derivative exchange Level Trading Field, told Cointelegraph. The exchanges believed if they built a Bitcoin futures product, the institutions would come, he said, but the response has been underwhelming. In March, for example, the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), the first U.S. exchange to introduce Bitcoin futures, announced that it would stop listing the product. Sarumi added:

Institutional investors appear to have found more attractive investment alternatives elsewhere, and Ether futures arent likely to fare any better. We are talking about Ether, the cryptocurrency, not Ethereum, the blockchain platform which continues to attract interest from institutions.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin futures contracts at CME averaged 5,534 contracts traded per day in the third quarter of 2019, up 10% from the same quarter in 2018, but down from the second quarter of 2019, the company told Cointelegraph, noting that institutional interest was building in the third quarter. Recently, CME has also notified the CFTC that it was raising the spot contract limit from 1,000 to 2,000.

Meanwhile, an offering form the Intercontinental Exchanges Bakkt platform had a record day on Oct. 9, with 224 Bitcoin future contracts with volume of $1.92 million. However, most days over the past two weeks (Sept. 24Oct. 15) have had a daily volume less than $1 million.

Futures are simply contracts to buy or sell a designated quantity of an asset at a specified price and date, and they are particularly useful when the underlying asset is volatile, which is the case with Bitcoin and to a lesser degree with Ether, as David L. Yermack, professor at NYU Stern, noted to Cointelegraph. These regulated futures contracts can help to stabilize the crypto market, he said:

"I dont see many differences in the economic rationales for Ether futures compared to Bitcoin. Ether has a lot less speculative trading volume, however, so it remains to be seen how much demand exists for Ether futures."

Questions remain, however: Will futures trading lead to financial manipulation or the cornering of the market? Some worry that the government is relying on profit-seeking exchanges (e.g., CME and CBOE) rather than the CFTC, a government regulator to self-certify new futures products, Indiana University professor Margaret Ryznar wrote.

Self-certification requires the exchange to prove that the new contract is not readily susceptible to manipulation, with Ryznar adding, Futures generally contribute to systemic risk, but distinctive features of Bitcoin futures heighten concerns.

Even though the SEC and CFTC seem to accept that both Bitcoin and Ether are commodities and not securities such clarity is not assured for the future. It seems to depend on the degree of decentralization at hand (i.e., the extent to which a cryptocurrency is controlled by a third party).

You can have a situation where something in an initial coin offering is a security, but over time, it gets more decentralized, and there's a tangible value there, so you can have things that change back and forth, Tarbert said. This may not be ideal, especially for institutional investors desiring regulatory predictability.

Spencer Bogart, head of research for Blockchain Capital, noted that shorting Bitcoin is "extremely risky" because there is no natural point, like priceearnings ratios, where people can tell if the cryptocurrency is over-valued. The same could presumably be said for Ether.

Indeed, the Futures Industry Association (FIA) has opined that Ether, more technically complex than Bitcoin because of its smart contract overlay, may be more difficult to risk manage. The FIA urged the CFTC to thoroughly vet any Ether derivative contract.

As noted, CME intends to launch a Bitcoin options product in the first quarter of 2020, pending regulatory review. While both futures and options are derivatives, they work differently. Futures commit a buyer to selling or buying the underlying asset at the previously agreed upon strike price.

Options, by comparison, are not obligatory; the option may never be exercised. Options are expected to be popular among Asian traders and miners, CMEs Tim McCourt said. Asked about the significance of Tarberts recent remarks, Sarumi said:

They are very significant. Any firm that was hesitating before now has a statement they can fall back on. But will it encourage institutional investors? I dont think so.

In his first public appearance as CFTC chairman, Tarbert also stressed the importance of blockchain and digital assets to the U.S., sweet music to digital evangelists like the Chamber of Digital Commerce. The U.S. has been falling behind in blockchain innovation, receiving little support from U.S. policymakers and regulators, Boring said, but here the chairman of the CFTC was saying, I want the United States to lead because whoever leads in this technology is going to end up writing the rules of the game.

Overall, it is fair to say that it has been a struggle for regulators and the exchanges to develop Bitcoin derivatives that are both safe and attractive to investors, especially institutions. Doing the same for technically complex Ether derivatives could be even more of a challenge.

The rest is here:

Ethereum Futures: The Next Big Derivative to Hit the Market? - Cointelegraph

Ethereum price is currently recovering higher versus the US Dollar, similar to bitcoin. However, ETH price must settle above $180 to continue higher in the near term.

Yesterday, we saw an extended decline in Ethereum below the $180 support against the US Dollar. Moreover, ETH price settled below the $180 support and the 100 hourly simple moving average. The decline was such that the price traded close to the $170 level. A swing low was formed near $171 before the price started an upside correction. It recovered above the $174 and $175 resistances.

Additionally, this weeks followed major bearish trend line was breached with resistance near $174 on the hourly chart of ETH/USD. The pair climbed above the 23.6% Fib retracement level of the last decline from the $188 high to $171 low. Finally, the price spiked above the $178 resistance area. However, the upward move is facing hurdle near the $180 resistance and the 100 hourly simple moving average.

Moreover, the price failed to test the 50% Fib retracement level of the last decline from the $188 high to $171 low. Ethereum retreated from highs and it is currently trading below $178. It seems like the $180 area and the 100 hourly SMA are crucial barriers. Therefore, a successful close above $180 could push the bulls to continue higher in the near term.

If not, there is a risk of another decline below the $175 level. The main support is near the $172 and $170 levels. If there are more downsides, the price is likely to accelerate its decline below the $165 level. The next key support is near the $160 level.

Looking at the chart, Ethereum price is facing a strong resistance near the $180 level and the 100 hourly SMA. If there is a successful close above $180, the price could recover towards the $185 level. An intermediate resistance is near the 61.8% Fib retracement level of the last decline from the $188 high to $171 low.

Hourly MACD The MACD for ETH/USD is likely to move into the bearish zone.

Hourly RSI The RSI for ETH/USD is currently moving lower towards the 50 level.

Major Support Level $170

Major Resistance Level $180

Read more:

Ethereum (ETH) Rebound Faces Major Hurdle Near $180 - newsBTC

Resistance areas are very significant in determining the scope of a cryptocurrencys, such as Ethereums, price movements. Once a resistance area is broken, it is likely to act as support afterward and vice versa. A breakout above a resistance area often triggers rapid price increases.

The Ethereumprice was rejected by the $360 resistance area on June 27. A breakout above this area could trigger a rapid increase towards new highs. Until the breakout, ETH is likely to accumulate between the current price and the resistance area.

Cryptocurrency analyst @cryptodude stated that Ethereum is his favorite chart and will be remembered in the future as an essential chart.

He also outlined a resistance line at $360 that has been significant in both May-November 2017 and in June 2019. This might suggest that a breakout above it could cause a similar movement to that in 2017. Why does he think that? Lets take a deep dive and analyze the possibilities.

Looking at the weekly Ethereum chart, we can see that the $360 area acted as resistance throughout May-November 2017.

Afterward, it supported the price in April 2018 before ETH broke down.

Finally, the area acted as resistance again on June 27, the current 2019 high.

However, there is one big dissimilarity between these two movements.

Throughout the 2017 movement, ETH created an ascending support line which held until the price broke out. On the contrary, in the 2019 movement, the support line held for several months before the price broke down. Afterward, ETH came back to validate it as resistance before moving downward. This is a common movement after a breakdown and often indicates that further decreases are in store.

Looking at the daily chart, we can see that the Ethereum price is trading inside a descending wedge quickly approaching the end of the projected pattern.

We can also see that a bearish cross between the 100- and 200-day moving averages (MA) has occurred, signifying that further decreases are ahead.

Therefore, we could see the scenario in which the Ethereum price decreases to the end of the wedge, breaks out, and then continues an upward movement.

So, a very rough outline of how the price movement might follow is given below:

If we try to make a comparison to the emotional phases of the market cycle, this fits right in our hypothesis laid out in one of our previous articles.

Do you think Ethereum will break out from the $360 resistance area? Let us know in the comments below.

[Disclaimer: This article is not trading advice and should not be construed as such. Always consult a trained financial professional before investing in cryptocurrencies, as the market is particularly volatile.]

Images courtesy of Twitter, TradingView.

See the rest here:

Ethereum Breakout Above $360 Means Skys the Limit, Believes Cryptocurrency Analyst - BeInCrypto

Marking a significant milestone for TRON (TRX), the popular web browser, Opera, is extending its wallet and DApp support to the TRON network. With its integration in the Opera browser, TRON joins the same ranks previously held just by crypto behemoths, Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Opera browser users all 350 million of them can already send and receive BTC and ETH, but now will also be able to transact TRX directly within the mobile and desktop browser. Not only that, the users will be able to easily use TRON DApps on their smartphones, to be listed in the browsers built-in DApps store.

Operas support for the TRON network allows for a massive increase in global access to the networks decentralized applications, with a new library of apps awaiting users outside the iOS App store and Google Play Store.

As noted in a recent DApp report, TRON enjoys its status as the largest DApp platform launched after 2017, adding 500,000 new users in recent months. TRONs DApp ecosystem tends to focus on gaming mostly gambling with a few DApps focused on other activities such as trading which is a lot like gambling in todays unpredictable markets.

Never one to downplay any sort of positive crypto news, TRON founder and BitTorrent CEO, Justin Sun, shared his enthusiasm about the integration, which will give daily users from 120 countries access to the high throughput, low-cost network: Opera is one of the most important software companies in the world. They are bringing security, privacy, and dynamic cryptocurrency capabilities to hundreds of millions of users.

Sun expressed his excitement about the new synergy between TRON and Opera, stating, We are proud to connect the largest, active blockchain ecosystem to the best web browser ever built.

As a leading privacy proponent, Opera offers a range of attractive features to web users, including a free built-in VPN, ad blocker, integrated messenger and a private mode. The addition of cryptocurrency integration furthers this goal, with Opera being the first major browser to integrate a crypto wallet for making secure crypto payments directly from a web browser.

source: CoinMarketCap

In cryptocurrency markets, TRX has levelled off against BTC and USD over the past few weeks, according to statistics provided on CoinMarketCap. Pricing cooled off in a midsummer move that saw prices ease back from nearly 4 cents USD to the current stable price, hovering around 1.5 cents since early September.

On the fundamentals side of the equation, TRON has seen steady growth in DApps, with fewer fluctuations in the average number of active users.

The total number of DApps exceeded 600 last week, with both the number of transactions and transaction volume increasing on a week-to-week basis, according to the most recent TRON DApp weekly report.

Link:

TRON Joins Bitcoin And Ethereum On Opera Browser - Crypto Briefing

Investing.com - Ethereum was trading at $157.43 by 12:01 (16:01 GMT) on the Investing.com Index on Wednesday, down 10.13% on the day. It was the largest one-day percentage loss since September 24.

The move downwards pushed Ethereum's market cap down to $17.32B, or 8.31% of the total cryptocurrency market cap. At its highest, Ethereum's market cap was $135.58B.

Ethereum had traded in a range of $157.43 to $171.61 in the previous twenty-four hours.

Over the past seven days, Ethereum has seen a drop in value, as it lost 8.98%. The volume of Ethereum traded in the twenty-four hours to time of writing was $8.85B or 12.55% of the total volume of all cryptocurrencies. It has traded in a range of $157.4338 to $178.3349 in the past 7 days.

At its current price, Ethereum is still down 88.94% from its all-time high of $1,423.20 set on January 13, 2018.

Bitcoin was last at $7,402.3 on the Investing.com Index, down 10.98% on the day.

XRP was trading at $0.26459 on the Investing.com Index, a loss of 11.24%.

Bitcoin's market cap was last at $135.35B or 64.96% of the total cryptocurrency market cap, while XRP's market cap totaled $11.74B or 5.64% of the total cryptocurrency market value.

Related Articles

XRP Falls 11% In Rout

Cardano Falls 10% In Selloff

Researcher: Google Quantum Breakthrough Could Improve Proof-of-Stake

See the original post:

Ethereum Falls 10% In Selloff - Yahoo Finance

Two major transfersone with 185,997 ETH and the other with 300,000 ETHhave been made just minutes apart from each other. They also appear to be mysteriously linked. Are whales accumulating?

Something strange just happened on the Ethereum network which has tipped off Whale Alert (@whale_alert). In just the span of a few minutes, over $88M worth of ETH was transferred and consolidated in wallets in just two transfers. The two moves appear to be linked by the same contract creator.

The first one was a transfer of 300,000 ETH ($54,969,131) to an unknown wallet. The transaction fee was only $0.08.

It seems to have been sent to a contract created three days ago. The address which created the contract only has 1.899 ETH, which is strange. The reason for this move is largely unexplained.

However, just 10 minutes later, there was another major transfer which set off Whale Alert (@whale_alert). 185,997 ETH ($34,019,838) was moved in a strange chain of events. The transaction fee was also $0.08, like last time.

Again, we have the same situation: ETH being sent to a contract. The contract creator is also, interestingly enough, the same addressthat created the recipient contract for the previous transfer. So, it seems that these two transfers of ETH are intertwined. This particular contract was created 53 days ago.

Its hard to say what the reason is for this consolidation of funds, in a contract on Ethereum no less a platform that could be ideal for revolutionaries fighting for their freedom. There is some speculation that this may be linked to a dApp in development, but it seems hard to believe that a dApp would need over $88M in funding. So, it could as well be a major whale storing their funds within a contract to HODL.

Perhaps the community will do some more digging on this strange transfer and we can get to the bottom of it this could be part of a consolidation period of Ethereum. However, for now, we can only speculate.

What do you think is the reason for this large transfer to two contracts on Ethereum? Let us know your thoughts below in the comments.

Images are courtesy of Twitter, Shutterstock.

Read this article:

Whale Consolidates $88M Worth of Ethereum in Two Transactions - BeInCrypto