Ethereum's Price Soars Past $2,500 In Wake Of Bitcoin ETF Approvals, Despite Gary Gensler's Cautious Crypto Stance

Amid the excitement surrounding the approval of Bitcoin BTC/USD ETFs, Ethereum ETH/USD has quietly experienced an 8.9% increase in its price over the past 24 hours, outshining Bitcoin in terms of price performance.

This rise is further underscored by a 108% surge in trading volumes, indicating a strong interest from investors.

What Happened: Ethereum on Wednesday surpassed the $2,500 mark for the first time since May 2022.

Layer 2 networks built on Ethereum but operating independently, Mantle (MNT) and Optimism OP/USD saw a surge of 14% and 23% respectively in the past 24 hours. Also, Lido LDO/USD and RocketPool (RPL) reported increases of 17% and 27% respectively.

In November 2023, BlackRock BLK  filed an S-1 form with the SEC for a spot Ether ETF, iShares Ethereum Trust. This would enable U.S. investors to gain spot exposure to Ethereum’s token.

Read Next: 'Ethereum Isn't Dead:' Top Crypto Analyst Delivers Christmas Cheer, Says 'Best Quarter' For ETH Approaching

What To Know: In SEC Chair Gary Gensler's official statement regarding the approval of the Spot Bitcoin ETF, he emphasized that this action  "should in no way signal the Commission’s willingness to approve listing standards for crypto asset securities."

The statement adds, “Nor does the approval signal anything about the Commission’s views as to the status of other crypto assets under the federal securities laws or about the current state of non-compliance of certain crypto asset market participants with the federal securities laws.”

Commissioner Hester M. Peirce in her statement said, "Perhaps the one silver lining here is now that we know that the Commission can execute a robust correlation analysis, perhaps the road to approving other spot crypto ETPs will not be as bumpy (even if the Commission insists on continuing to apply a test it applies nowhere else)."

Heavily followed Crypto user, Inmortal took to X to highlight that, "We are in a bull market, Capo was wrong. Ethereum will outperform BTC in 2024. Bitcoin is going to 50k fast."

Meanwhile, cycle forecaster and chartist BACH tweeted his initial price target for Ether.

#Ethereum Update

Ethereum shouldn't be ignored! Still looks incredibly bullish and ready to go!🚀

Showing some nice relative strength today. Seems like it's gearing up to break through that daily bull flag🚩

First target is still within the $3500 - $4000 range🎯#altcoins pic.twitter.com/35X2Scdw7M

— BACH (@MortensenBach) January 10, 2024

Now Read: SEC Confirms FBI Investigation Into Its Twitter Account Hack After False Bitcoin ETF Announcement

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