Hitting a near two-month high on Monday, Ethereum seems to be profiting while Bitcoin faces renewed uncertainty pertaining to a proposed November hard fork.
Ethereum settled around $330 on Monday, up about 10 percent. This comes on top of another quick rally of 15% that saw the second-biggest cryptocurrency top $347.05, its highest since June 23, according to CoinMarketCap.
Ethereum’s gains this year have been staggering, with a 70 percent increase for the month and more than 4,000 percent for the year.
A fractured Bitcoin community
Benjamin Roberts, co-founder and CEO of Citizen Hex, an Ethereum-focused start up, said:
"I think the gains in Ethereum are part of the market's reaction to the increasingly fractured bitcoin community.”
The new fear surrounding Bitcoin comes from another potential of another upgrade for the Bitcoin network, called SegWit2x. This follows August’s lock-in and upcoming activation of the SegWit fork. Despite a great deal of worry, Bitcoin’s August 1 fork went quite well.
Prices soared to a new all time high, surpassing $4,000 even with the creation of the new currency on the same chain - Bitcoin Cash.
No fear of the Ethereum fork
So far Ethereum has suffered no ill effects from its proposed upgrade, called ‘Metropolis,’ which is expected in the next few weeks. Metropolis is expected to improve transaction privacy and efficiency.
There are a few other factors pushing Ethereum’s growth, including demand from Korea. Also, the London-based online trading company IG will be supporting Ethereum trading beginning Monday.