Why Is Ethereum Classic (ETC) Surging Today?

Ethereum Classic ETC/USD spiked nearly 9% in the early hours of Tuesday after developers of the cryptocurrency announced that the “Magneto” network upgrade is on the way.

What Happened: The hard fork revelation was made by Stevan Lohja, developer relations manager for Mantis — a client and wallet for Ethereum Classic in a blog post.

See Also: How To Buy Ethereum Classic (ETC)

“Magneto will be inclusive of the Ethereum Berlin upgrade features,” wrote Lohja. He also disclosed that beta testing for ETC’s Morder and Kotti TestNets commenced on June 2 and June 9. 

The activation date for Sagano TestNet is not yet decided and the ETC MainNet is July 21. The Magneto hard fork schedule is contingent on successful TestNet activation and can change.

ETC traded 8.71% higher at $44.98 at press time over 24 hours. The cryptocurrency has risen 9.35% over a week’s time.

Why It Matters: The Berlin upgrade contains a number of Ethereum Improvement Proposals or EIPs pertaining to optimization gas and transactions, wrote Lohja. 

See Also: Why Is Ethereum Classic Surging, How Is It Different From Ethereum?

ETC has surged 694.35% since the year began. The cryptocurrency emerged after a contentious hardfork on the Ethereum ETH/USD blockchain in 2016.

Last month, Synergia Capital’s head of research, Denis Vinokourov, attributed the rise in the prices of ETC to it being a “cheaper” Ethereum play.

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