Ethereum Price Prediction as $10 Billion Trading Volume Comes In – Can $ETH Reach $2,000 Soon?
The Ethereum price has dropped to $1,552 today, representing a 5% fall in the past 24 hours and a 6% loss in a week. The decline comes amid a marketwide selloff, caused by Kraken paying a $30 million settlement to the SEC and agreeing to end all staking services for US-based clients.
Despite this knock to the market, Ethereum remains a strong prospect for investors, with the altcoin currently witnessing a 24-hour trading volume of over $10 billion. And with Visa recently saying that it’s trialing stablecoin payments on the Ethereum blockchain, there are plenty of reasons to suspect that ETH will recover once again.
Ethereum Price Prediction as $10 Billion Trading Volume Comes In – Can $ETH Reach $2,000 Soon?
Based solely on indicators, ETH is in a position for further losses at the moment. Its 30-day moving average (red) appears to have crested in relation to its 200-day (blue), so it should, along with its price, be due for falls.
In addition, ETH’s relative strength index (purple) has descended to just below 50, and may continue falling. As such, it really does seem like further losses could be in store for the altcoin this weekend.
Up until yesterday, ETH had been protected by a support level at around $1,600. However, it seems that yesterday’s news has provided the kind of negative event that forces an asset to fall through such a level.
Today we charged Kraken with failing to register the offer and sale of their crypto asset staking-as-a-service program, whereby investors transfer crypto assets to Kraken for staking in exchange for advertised annual investment returns of as much as 21 percent.
— U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (@SECGov) February 9, 2023
And it could fall further, given how much ETH, which is now a proof-of-stake cryptocurrency, relies on staking. Indeed, it’s worth noting that, despite the market falling as a whole, ETH has dropped further in the past 24 hours than Bitcoin, which is 3.5% down in the last 24 hours.
This negativity aside, members of the cryptocurrency community have already argued that the SEC’s charges against Kraken, and Kraken’s settlement, do not necessarily mean the end of staking in the US.
For instance, Coinbase has already insisted that it won’t be ending its own staking services and that it’s prepared to fight the US securities regulator on this issue.
Coinbase says Kraken news will not affect their staking program
— Frank Chaparro (@fintechfrank) February 9, 2023
Sources say they’re willing to fight SEC on this issue pic.twitter.com/6gMES5r50q
This leaves plenty of hope for the continuation of staking in the US, while obviously, the rest of the world remains unaffected by the SEC’s most recent power grab.
And looking at Ethereum, its strong fundamentals offer numerous reasons to suspect that it will rise again soon. For example, this past week brought the news that payment giant Visa is testing USDC stablecoin payments on the Ethereum blockchain.
Visa has been testing how to do large settlements using $usdc on #ethereum. #crypto is going to be an everyday part of everyone's lives soon. Get ready.
— Lark Davis (@TheCryptoLark) February 6, 2023
This is very bullish for Ethereum, and Visa’s growing involvement with the platform may help it reinforce its dominant position with the cryptocurrency ecosystem. In fact, some analysts believe that ETH will outperform Bitcoin this year, with Bloomberg’s Mike McGlone being the most notable example.
Bitcoin crosses series; Ethereum may be top candidate to continue outperforming the first born crypto –#Ethereum's advances vs. #Bitcoin have been unshaken by 2022 deflation in most risk assets and may be gaining underpinnings. pic.twitter.com/mLRMO4vpQr
— Mike McGlone (@mikemcglone11) December 20, 2022
There are various reasons for this optimism. For one, the Merge not only put Ethereum on course to become more scalable, but along with other upgrades (e.g. EIP 1559) it has also given ETH a tendency to become deflationary during periods of peak activity.
#Ethereum becomes deflationary when the token's burn rate (from transaction fees) is greater than the staking reward for validators
— Velvet.Capital (@Velvet_Capital) December 21, 2022
PoS ETH has only existed for a few months
In the next bull run, ETH may become even more deflationary with more people using Crypto regularly pic.twitter.com/Edpq0jrZR7
With all this in mind, there remains a very strong chance that ETH will not only recover back to $1,600, but will begin to trouble other levels soon enough. This includes $2,000, which is a realistic target for this year, while other levels may be achievable if the market manages to recover in general, free from negative news.
Is Now A Good Time to Buy Ethereum?
Despite ETH’s strong fundamentals and long-term potential, it may not be a great idea to buy it right now, given the fallout from Kraken’s settlement with the SEC yesterday. However, there are a number of other high-potential altcoins that do promise gains in the short term as well as the long term.
As such, we’ve listed the top 15 cryptocurrencies for 2023, as analyzed by the CryptoNews Industry Talk team.
The list is updated weekly with new altcoins and ICO projects, so be sure to check back for new entries.
Disclaimer: The Industry Talk section features insights by crypto industry players and is not a part of the editorial content of Cryptonews.com.
