Last year, when most cryptocurrencies were surging to new all-time highs, cryptocurrency enthusiasts started believing Ethereum’s ether was set to become the number one cryptocurrency as it was quickly closing in on bitcoin’s market cap. Since then, its value has plummeted nearly 80% against the flagship cryptocurrency.
Dubbed “The Flippening,” the scenario in which ETH surpasses BTC’s market cap was then a real possibility, as at its peak Ethereum managed to get about 80% of bitcoin’s market cap, after surging over 5,000% from $8 in early 2017. At the time Ethereum looked like it was going to top BTC, it was at little over $410, while bitcoin was at $3,000.
Ethereum’s ether was then trading at 0.1506 BTC. Since then, its value against the flagship cryptocurrency plummeted, as it’s now trading at 0.0331 BTC – a near 80% drop.
Since then, bitcoin went on to hit a $20,000 all-time high, while ether managed to hit the $1,400 mark. While ETH is currently trading at $199 after falling 0.8% in the last 24-hour period, BTC is at $6,360, down 0.7% in said period.
At the time ethereum was surging thanks to various factors, including the initial coin offering (ICO) boom that saw various projects raise billions worth of the cryptocurrency. The reason for its boom seemingly led to the bust as well, as short seller pressure and ICO sell-offs saw its price decline.
Given the price developments, bitcoin’s market share of the cryptocurrency ecosystem is now at 53.3%, while that of ether is at 9.96%. When the Flippening seemed imminent, bitcoin’s market share was of 39%, while ether’s was of 31%.
As crypto investment firm New Waves Capital CEO Eric Campbell pointed out, users may be turning to BTC during the bear market, and may turn to other cryptocurrencies as soon as the bulls come back. For now, bitcoin has been reigning supreme.
According to a website created last year to monitor the Flippening, ETH is only above the flagship cryptocurrency in terms of transactions per day and in the number of nodes.
Currently, ETH takes up less than 19% of BTC’s market cap, but has seen over 580,000 transactions go through its network in the last 24 hours, while BTC saw 260,000. Ethereum has 13,000 nodes, 3,000 more than bitcoin.
On the other hand, Google search interest is superior for bitcoin, just like mining rewards and trading volume.
