The competition among layer-one smart contract platforms has been on the rise in the past couple of months as traders and developers continue to embrace Ethereum network alternatives that offer faster transaction times and lower fees. According to a recent report from Delphi Digital, the price of Ether (ETH) has remained relatively flat over the past month, while competitors suc as Solana (SOL) and Fantom (FTM) have seen their prices rally more than 200% during the same time. One of the drivers of the rallies seen in Fantom (FTM), Avalanche (AVAX) and Terra (LUNA) is the fact that each has …

Interoperability has become one of the driving themes within the crypto market and as the blockchain ecosystem evolves into an interconnected web of layer-one protocols, the importance of communication and efficiency among decentralized applications (dApps) will also increase. Ren (REN), a blockchain protocol designed to provide interoperability and liquidity between different blockchain platforms, has started gaining traction over the past month and a half as activity in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector has been on the rise. Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that after reaching a low of $00.41 on Aug. 9, the price of REN has …

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren, known by many as an outspoken cryptocurrency skeptic in the United States government, criticized outages at exchanges and high transaction fees during periods of price volatility. In a Tuesday hearing of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs with Securities and Exchange Commission chair Gary Gensler, Warren claimed the crypto industry had fallen short on providing solutions for financial inclusion in the United States. She mentioned the price drops among cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) last week, saying “$400 billion in market value disappeared” while many users reported problems accessing major exchanges …

Block data from Blockchain.com reveals that a colossal Bitcoin (BTC) transaction worth $2 billion was processed on Monday night. Despite the enormous financial value, the unknown wallet holder only paid 0.00001713 BTC fees equivalent to $0.78. Although it is unknown what the purpose of this transfer was, or indeed which individual or entity enacted it, what has clearly been showcased is the enormous potential of financial transactions utilizing cryptocurrency and blockchain technologies. However, this is not the first instance of a transaction of this magnitude with minimal fees. Back in August 2020, a Bitcoin transaction worth $1 billion was recorded …

A blockchain project says that it has successfully completed one of the biggest protocol changes in its history. Lisk says the migration from Mainnet v2 to Mainnet v3 heralds the start of a whole new era for its network — eliminating weaknesses related to fees and its consensus algorithm. Simultaneously, it perfectly sets the stage for an upcoming interoperability release. The blockchain’s users can now benefit from an “extremely secure” account address system that comes equipped with built-in error detection for typos. Addresses are also now longer, and it is hoped that this will reduce the likelihood of address collisions. …

Decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol Cream Finance will pay back its users following a $18.8 million flash loan hack that occurred on Aug. 30. Cream has published a post-mortem to the AMP flash loan exploit, promising to replace the stolen Ether (ETH) and Amp (AMP) tokens by allocating 20% of all protocol fees until the debt is paid entirely. Cream will also post collateral with relevant parties at AMP and its creators, Flexa digital payments network, to secure the debt. According to the post-mortem report, the latest flash loan exploit was the first time Cream Finance has suffered a direct exploit, …

Ether (ETH) will face a critical $820 million monthly options expiry on Friday, Aug. 27. That will be the first time that $3,000 and higher options will have a real fighting chance, even though bulls seem to have missed a good opportunity to dominate the expiry because they were too optimistic about Ether’s price potential. It is unclear why $140 million of the neutral-to-bullish call options were placed between $3,800 and $8,000, but these instruments will likely become worthless as the monthly expiry approaches. Competition and the success of interoperability-focused protocols impact Ether price The Ethereum network has struggled due …

The latest rally in the Cardano (ADA) market has activated a classic bearish pattern that threatens to lower its prices by as much as 15%. Dubbed as a rising wedge, the textbook pattern forms when the price consolidates between upward sloping resistance and support trendlines. Its occurrence typically prompts a bearish reversal, confirmed by a voluminous break below the lower trendline. The profit target during such a negative move comes to be as below as the maximum wedge height. ADA/USD currently ticks all the boxes for forming a falling wedge pattern, as shown in the chart below. The pair now …

Decentralized exchange aggregator 1inch has announced its deployment on the Optimistic Ethereum (OE) mainnet, highlighting a considerable reduction in user transaction fees and confirmation delays. Sergej Kunz, co-founder of the 1inch Network, stated that "The 1inch launch on Optimistic will facilitate a dramatic increase in transaction speed." While deposits utilizing the OE network are set to be credited almost instantly, withdrawals will require a waiting period of seven days. These wait times are expected to improve when fast withdrawal service is enabled sometime in the future. At the time of launch, the OE network will only be able to handle …

Leading decentralized exchange Uniswap has become the first decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol to generate more than $1 billion worth of platform fees for liquidity providers. On Tuesday, Lucas Outumuro, head of research at crypto data aggregator IntoTheBlock, shared a chart on Twitter showing that the combined fee revenues of Uniswap’s v2 and v3 Ethereum mainnet deployments have surpassed $1 billion. Including the fees generated by both Uniswap v1 and its v3 deployment on Optimism, Outumuro noted that roughly $1.02 billion has been distributed to Uniswap liquidity providers since the protocol’s creation in November 2018. By contrast, IntoTheBlock’s data shows that …

The London hard fork arrived almost on schedule at 12:33 pm UTC on Thursday at block height 12,965,000, ushering in the Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 1559. With the upgrade triggered, Ethereum will now undergo a significant overhaul of the network’s transaction fee market and other parameters such as gas refunds among others. Under EIP-1559, each transaction on Ethereum will involve burning the base fee, which automatically decreases the Ether (ETH) circulating supply. Several exchanges, including Binance, announced a temporary pause to deposit and withdrawals on the Ethereum network due to the London hard fork. Some proponents of the upgrade say …

Ethereum’s London upgrade is set to activate on Thursday, according to the countdown available on Ethereum.org. “The London upgrade is scheduled to go live on Ethereum in August 2021, on block 12,965,000,” Ethereum.org reads. “It will introduce EIP-1559, which reforms the transaction fee market, along with changes to how gas refunds are handled and the Ice Age schedule.” Ethereum Improvement Proposal 1559, or EIP-1559, will directly affect how the network handles transaction fees. Going forward, each transaction will burn a base fee, thereby decreasing the asset's circulating supply and giving users the option of including a tip to help incentivize …