After months of development, [Ethereum](/coins/eth) finally announced their Proof of Stake test net Kintsugi went live on December 20th.

Until Monday, Kintsugi had been only available to developers looking to experiment and build ahead of the much anticipated launch of Ethereum 2.0 next year. The successful launch of Kintsugi was announced by lead developer Tim Beiko on Monday in a series of tweets. 

Beiko stated “Although client development and UX continue to be refined, we encourage the community to start using Kintsugi to familiarize themselves with Ethereum in a post-merge context. For application developers, as previously explained, not much will change. Tooling which only interacts with either the consensus or execution layer is also largely unaffected.”

Testnets often launch prior to main net to enable developers to test applications in a controlled setting.

## Bad for the environment

The launch of Ethereum2.0 will finally see the complete transition to a Proof of Stake consensus mechanism. Proof of Work blockchains are seen as slow, costly and harmful to the environment and therefore adopting the Proof of Stake model is the logical approach.

The move has taken longer than many people expected however the launch of Kintsugi is a clear indication that the time of reckoning is moving closer. Many industry experts believe Ethereum 2.0 will be ready for public use sometime in Spring next year.

## Smart contract development

The calls for Ethereum 2.0 grow louder by the day. With Ethereum transactions taking anywhere between 5 minutes and four hours depending on network congestion, a Proof of Work model will bring much needed speed to the network. Current transaction costs also make the network unattractive to developers. The general feeling is that when Ethereum 2.0 is launched we will see a massive rise in network use and smart contract application development which will benefit all areas of the industry.

## Stability

Kintsugi will run until the network reaches stability along with other pre launched testnets. Beiko explained that “existing long lived testnets will run through ‘The Merge’. Once these have upgraded and are stable, next up is Ethereum mainnet transition to Proof of Stake.”



Ethereum POS Testnet Kintsugi Release 

It was all eyes on the price of [Ethereum](/coins/eth) at the end of the week as many industry experts predicted a sharp breakout is on the immediate horizon.

Twitter and the internet were yesterday alight with rumours that Ethereum was about to break out to the upside in a strong move reminiscent of late 2017.

The price of Ethereum against Bitcoin at the time of writing sat at 0.08btc with many technical experts expecting a surge to at least 0.2btc which, given the present price of Bitcoin hovering around the $56,500 mark, would bring Ethereum into the $11,000 territory.

With the long-awaited launch of Ethereum 2.0 due to be finally revealed sometime during Q1 of 2022, an increase in Ethereum’s price would seem like a sure-fire bet.

## The Future of Finance

However, in typical Murphy’s Law fashion, as Ethereum came within 2% of its all-time high of $4,845, the United States Lower House announced details of a meeting scheduled for Wednesday, December 8th to discuss Digital Assets and the Future of Finance, leading to uncertainty and a cooling of the optimistic price action.

That being said, if the current price trajectory through 2021 continues, 2022 looks like it could be a very promising year for Ethereum.

In late 2017 the price of Ethereum against Bitcoin hit an all-time high of 0.15btc before cooling considerably through 2018 and 2019. In May this year, as the crypto market pumped in unison, we saw Ethereum reach 0.085btc leading to a price of $4,300. Since then, the price of Ethereum/Bitcoin has been consolidating just below 0.08btc although a significant break out above the trend line this week has created many new calls for optimism.

## More turkey or time for something new?

While a 550% increase in the price of Ethereum through 2021 may sound like a cause for celebration, when compared against the 14,800% gains made by rival smart contract platform Solana it is clear Ethereum has a lot of catching up to do.

The major hindrance for Ethereum so far has been the low speeds and high transaction fees to conduct business across the network.

While it is still the number one place to go to for smart contract and decentralised applications (dApps) development, the high costs and slow speeds have made many of Ethereum’s competitors a much more attractive proposition. However, the general feeling is that the launch of Ethereum 2.0 will solve these issues and then significant building on the platform can begin in earnest.

Ethereum is thought of as the ‘home’ of DeFi with many of the industry’s latest finance protocols using Ethereum as their basis for their application. The same goes for the world of NFTs with many projects using the ERC-20 token to mint and launch their latest creations.

Both factors show the use of the Ethereum network is already strong and grew at an exponential rate throughout 2022.

The real question around the dinner table this Christmas is what impact will lower fees and faster speeds have on an already massively popular and trusted network? And what impact will this have on the Ethereum price.

Will it be turkey curry for days or can we afford something a little more extravagant in 2022? Only time will tell.


Ethereum Latest News: Showing Strength

Recent developments to the [Ethereum](/coins/eth) blockchain have finally made Ethereum a deflationary token.

Throughout 2021, Ethereum has been transitioning from a Proof of Work to a Proof of Stake consensus driven network. While this process has taken a considerable amount of time, the deflationary nature of Ethereum has finally come to pass.

## EIP-1559

Under the terms of the Ethereum Improvement Protocol (EIP 1559), every Ethereum transaction, from its August 2021 release forward, consisted of a percentage burn of the final transaction as the network transitioned toward the Proof of Stake model.

Now, for the first time since the upgrade, Ethereum is officially a deflationary token as more Ethereum is being burnt than generated, which will lead to its scarcity and an increase in its future value.

While this may sound like a cause for celebration, many original Ethereum miners are less than happy with the upgrade due to the loss of fee revenue which is associated with a mining and Proof of Work consensus model.

## Staking

As part of the new Proof of Stake model holders of Ethereum are able to loan their tokens back to the network to be used as a stake in order to generate passive income. The current going rate for staking Ethereum on the new network is around 4% per annum.

To date over 8.3 million Ethereum worth $34 billion have been staked and therefore locked up in contracts and taken off the open market. Together with the deflationary burn model the scarcity of Ethereum has seen the price of the token rise from $736 at the start of the year to $ 4200 today.  
  
Now that Ethereum is officially in deflationary status this value will automatically increase with every transaction. And with the merge to the official Ethereum 2.0 main net chalked for Spring 2022 many market commentators are expecting the price of Ethereum to witness a major surge through 2022.

## The last mile

Final testing is due to start in December and developers are focussing on this last mile of what has been a long and arduous process. According to a leading crypto exchange ‘Protocol Specialist’ Viktor Bunin the net issuance of Ethereum has reduced by 66% since the launch of EIP-1559 and as validators continue to replace miners the numbers will only increase.


Ethereum Price Becomes Deflationary

What can we expect from the [Ethereum](/articles/learn-moni/ethereum-vs-bitcoin) price prediction for 2022?

[Ethereum](/coins/eth) holders have enjoyed a rollercoaster year, to say the least.

The prized crypto asset commenced the year at less than $800 apiece, rose to over $4,300 (its all-time high at the time) in May, fell to less than $1,900 in July following China’s crypto ban and broke its all-time high in October, after the launch of a ProShares futures-based Bitcoin ETF product (BITO).

The Valkyrie futures-based Bitcoin ETF was launched within a week of BITO’s approval. To put it into perspective, Ethereum has grown 956,745.2% in roughly six years! Ethereum will be the next crypto asset to surpass $10,000 in valuation. The question is, will the crypto token cross $10k in 2022? I believe so.

## What does 2022 hold in store for Ethereum?

2022 will be a HUGE year for Ethereum enthusiasts. While I understand the hype surrounding bitcoin breaking its all-time high this month, Ethereum is set to the top three crypto asset which will have the best time in 2022. Yes, bitcoin will breach the $100,000 barrier, but the launch of Ethereum 2.0 is what the world should be excited about.

Ethereum 2.0 will enhance the network’s transaction processing speed considerably, from a miserly 15 transactions per second (TPS) to an enormous 100,000 TPS, thanks to sharding technology and a transition from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake (PoS). This will place Ethereum as the fastest blockchain in the world, followed by Solana at 50,000 TPS.

Other benefits of Ethereum 2.0 include greater security and sustainability. The transition to Ethereum 2.0 will solve many existing problems and may lead to the wide-scale adoption of the crypto asset.

I believe that Ethereum will not only cross $10,000 in 2022 but also reach $15,000 (potentially). I will not be surprised if El Salvador or any other country for that matter adopts Ethereum as a legal tender next year.


 Ethereum Price Prediction in 2022

All eyes were on Ethereum today as the world second largest cryptocurrency made a push for a new all time high.

At time of press, Ethereum was trading hands for $3,782 a 24 hour rise of just 1.28%. Compared to other crypto gains this may sound small but the price of Ethereum has a solid floor and has been a consistent performer lately gaining 11% in the last month and 102% in the last quarter alone.

Ethereum hit an all time price high in May of this year when it topped out at $4,170 before falling over 100% to $1,787 at the end of July. Since then there has been a steady increase week on week to the price we see today.

## EIP-1559

One of the catalysts for this strong and stable growth was the much anticipated Ethereum Improvement Protocol upgrade (EIP-1559) which saw Ethereum begin the transfer to a more efficient, cheaper and greener Proof of Stake mechanism rather than the outdated Proof of Work model it has been using.

The transfer to the new system is anticipated to take another 6 months to fully complete however as each project milestone falls investor confidence continues to increase. This was evident in the last 24 hours as $1.348 billion worth of Ethereum was transferred in 15 huge transactions. Although impossible to identify who was moving and where the Ethereum was going these colossal sums go some way to highlight the massive amount of money involved in the Ethereum network.

## Alternative future investments

With many traditional investors beginning to question the validity of gold and silver, Bitcoin and Ethereum and beginning to be seen as strong alternative investments. Furthermore, Ethereum has more appeal than Bitcoin due to the ever increasing eco-system being built on top of the world largest smart contract network.

As we transgress through Q4, many people believe we are on the cusp of seeing massive institutional investment into cryptocurrency and digital assets due to their cost and time savings.

With the market poised and more network upgrades scheduled for the next couple of months allowing for further utility, Ethereum certainly looks as if it could have a very interesting future indeed.

Ethereum USD closes in on ATH. What happens next?

Ethereum is the heir apparent to the cryptocurrency throne. [Bitcoin](/coins/btc) is the king of cryptocurrencies and will continue to capture the interest of all investor classes for several years. El Salvador became the first country to accept Bitcoin as legal tender in early September 2021.

The country hopes to utilise Bitcoin as a mode to facilitate cross-country payments and save millions in fees levied by financial institutions. Several businesses have included Bitcoin as a payment option globally. That said, Bitcoin has no real applications – any cryptocurrency can be used to suffice the mentioned purposes and in fact, most will fare better.

## Popular cryptocurrency transaction speeds compared

To put it into perspective, Bitcoin can process up to 7 transactions per second (TPS). Neo on the other hand can process up to 10,000 TPS and Ripple can support 1,500 TPS. While Ethereum can only handle up to 15 TPS at the moment, Ethereum 2.0 is the answer – Ethereum 2.0 promises up to 100,000 TPS!

## Why Ethereum and Ethereum 2.0, in particular, is the real deal

The rollout of Ethereum 2.0 not only promises quicker transaction speeds than are currently available but also a plethora of other improvements to the Ethereum blockchain. Ethereum serves a variety of use cases already which makes it the most important crypto asset in the crypto sphere. The key benefits of Ethereum 2.0 include:

*   A switch from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake (PoS) for quicker transactions and lower fees.
*   Ethereum holders will be able to earn rewards from staking.
*   The implementation of sharding for higher TPS.
*   More practical for average users. 

We must accredit Bitcoin as the pioneer of the crypto industry and the most important component in the worldwide acceptance of cryptocurrencies but Ethereum is the crypto asset of the present and the future.

Ethereum Prediction: Prince of Cryptocurrencies

In an effort to be ‘maximally compliant with regulatory requirements’ the world’s second largest [Ethereum](/coins/eth) mining pool announced today that all operations are to halt at the end of the month.

Hangzhou based SparkPool released the information yesterday confirming all activities were to cease by Thursday 30th September.

This announcement closely follows Friday’s decision that all new users were banned from registering with SparkPool with immediate effect.

## SparkPool Contribute 22% of Hash Rate

Since its inception in 2016, SparkPool has evolved to become the world’s second largest Ethereum mining operation by hash rate closely behind industry behemoth Ethermine. SparkPool currently contribute 22% of the entire Ethereum hash rate with a whopping 142 terra-hash per second.

SparkPool’s announcement follows a call from the State Council of China in May this year for local authorities to crack down on crypto mining activities and, while this had been somewhat of a success, a number of stealth mining operations have been slowly resuming work over the last few months.

## China's Decision May Have an Impact

Many people believe the announcement was heavily influenced by the Chinese Central Government’s recent decision to declare all crypto related activity illegal with immediate effect (Thursday 23rd September).

Following the initial country wide clampdown in May this year, Bitcoin miners Poolin and BIT Mining have been looking for new premises and had ear marked North America and Central Asia as possible new sites.

While SparkPool could also have circumnavigated the ban by taking their mining operation overseas they evidently have chosen not to.

Global mining outfit, Huobi, declared on Sunday September 26th that all China based users will be unable to access their services by the end of the year.

The news did not come as a huge surprise to many industry leaders as China continue to crackdown on the cryptocurrency eco-system within the country. Consequently, SparkPool seem to have made the decision with the purpose of protecting client assets.  
  
The impact on Ethereum network performance and price is yet to be seen.

Many proponents view the China ban as bullish for crypto as pushback from China has historically been good for the rest of the Western world. In 2009, China banned Facebook and YouTube from its shores closely followed Google and Wikipedia. All went on to see massive success in other markets.  
  
SparkPool have not released any further information regarding their future plans at this point however given Ethereum’s continued port to a Proof of Stake non-mining mechanism SparkPool’s decision may be rather telling.



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Ethereum Prediction: Prince of Cryptocurrencies

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