Ethereum course at all-time high:

Demand for bitcoin alternative is rising rapidly

The cryptocurrency Ethereum has reached a new all-time high in the shadow of the Bitcoin price rally on Friday. Within a year, it went up by over 4,700 percent.

Bitcoin alternative Ethereum reaches all-time high

The Bitcoin price overflowed the $ 8,000 mark earlier this week, reaching a new all-time high. Ethereum has also announced its upward course of recent days on Friday, reaching a new record high of around $ 466. Currently (22:00 clock) notes the Ethereum rate at 452 US dollars. Within a year, Bitcoin was up 4,700 percent.

Industry observers see the reason for the current Ethereum hype in the growing demand from investors for Bitcoin alternatives, as reported by Finanzen.net. Newcomers in particular would be deterred by the bitcoin price of more than 8,000 US dollars. Therefore, they obviously prefer to access the cheaper competitor.

Ethereum is the second most valuable cryptocurrency with a market capitalization of $ 44 billion currently (according to Coinmarketcap.com) behind Bitcoin ($ 137.4 billion). In recent days, Ethereum has handled more transactions than any other competing digital currency, including its heavyweight Bitcoin. By comparison, while Ethereum handles more than 500,000 daily transactions, bitcoin has around 330,000.

Ethereum: Second largest cryptocurrency allows more transactions than Bitcoin

A disadvantage of Bitcoin's underlying technology is the blockchain size of just one megabyte, which not only limits the throughput of transactions, but also makes them more expensive. At Ethereum, on the other hand, there is still room for improvement, which means that the platform could supply twice as much demand - and at comparatively low fees. Another reason for the current contribution to Ethereum could still be the cancellation of the bitcoin update SegWit2x, which has meanwhile let the bitcoin price rush down to 5,600 US dollars.