Key facts:
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With this rise, Ethereum Classic returns to levels of a month and a half ago.
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ETC is one of the cryptocurrencies with the smallest drop in this bear market.
Ethereum Classic (ETC) has seen a dizzying price increase in recent days. About 70% upwards from July 13 to date. And all thanks to the imminent end of mining in Ethereum, the network from which Ethereum Classic was born.
In a span of just 6 days, ETC has gone from $13.34 at its lowest point to $22.66 at the time of writing. This impulse represents an increase in its price of 69.87% in that brief period, in data from CoinMarketCap.
This momentum places ETC at the price levels it had at the beginning of June, showing signs of a recovery in the medium term. A next level to pick up would be $30, a price last seen in early May.
This bear market has been unforgiving with most major cryptocurrencies. Even the two most important assets in this ecosystem: bitcoin (BTC), down 53% this year; and ether (ETH) of Ethereum with less than 60% this 2020.
But Ethereum Classic is one of the least affected cryptocurrencies this year. At least among the top 100 according to market capitalization. Leaving aside LEO, a Bitfinex token, the only one on that list with green numbers, there are only three others with a smaller drop than ETC this year. Even so, its loss of market value exceeds 34%.
An Ethereum without miners, a promising future for ETC?
According to the developers of Ethereum, the transition to the new version of their network is already dated: September 19. From that moment on, if the forecast is fulfilled, there will be no more mining in that network, which puts those who dedicate themselves to this activity at a crossroads: sell their equipment and withdraw from that business or migrate to other networkswith the risk of being unprofitable.
Assuming they opt for the latter, one of the networks potentially benefiting would be precisely that of Ethereum Classic, which emerged from a fork of Ethereum. Not only the equipment used to mine Ethereum might very well be used for mining ETCbut the rise in prices of the latter might make it more attractive in terms of profitability, as We recently reviewed in CriptoNoticias.
At the moment, it seems that a good number of miners have started to disconnect from Ethereum. At least between the peak of June 6 to date, the processing power accumulated in that network has dropped almost 20% in CoinWarz data.
For now that power does not seem to be moving to Ethereum Classic. Although the latter has seen a surge in computing power recently, it is still far from its peaks this year. It is to be hoped if the push to the coin makes more miners decide to go that route as the end of Ethereum mining draws near.
