$ETH Ethereum (ETH) is the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain, a decentralized, open-source platform launched in 2015 by Vitalik Buterin and co-founders. Unlike Bitcoin, which primarily serves as a digital currency, Ethereum is designed to support smart contracts—self-executing agreements coded on the blockchain—and decentralized applications (dApps). ETH powers these functions, serving as "gas" to pay for transaction fees and computational services on the network.
Key Details:
Market Position: Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, trailing only Bitcoin. As of April 25, 2025, ETH's price fluctuates around $1,774–$3,675 USD, with a market cap ranging from ~$214B to $442B, depending on sources.
Circulating Supply: Approximately 120.7 million ETH, with no fixed cap, unlike Bitcoin’s 21 million limit. New ETH is issued through staking rewards, but mechanisms like EIP-1559 (introduced in 2021) burn a portion of transaction fees, potentially making ETH deflationary during high network activity.
Consensus Mechanism: Ethereum transitioned from proof-of-work (PoW) to proof-of-stake (PoS) in September 2022 via "The Merge," reducing energy consumption by ~99%. Validators stake 32 ETH to secure the network and earn rewards.
Use Cases: ETH is used for:
Paying gas fees for transactions and smart contracts.
Serving as collateral in decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols.
Powering dApps, including NFTs, decentralized exchanges (DEXs), and DAOs.
Investment and store of value, with significant growth since its 2014 ICO price of $0.31.
Ecosystem: Ethereum hosts the largest dApp ecosystem, supporting DeFi (e.g., MakerDAO, Uniswap), NFTs (via ERC-721 tokens), and ERC-20 tokens for numerous cryptocurrencies. It dominates ~17% of the crypto market cap.
Scalability Challenges: Ethereum faces high gas fees and network congestion during peak usage, processing ~15–30 transactions per second (TPS). Upgrades like sharding and the Pectra hard fork (expected soon) aim to improve scalability and reduce costs.
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