Ether hits $3,000 on Monday. The second-largest cryptocurrency is having a whopping rise ahead of London hardfork.

Ethereum is now larger than Walt Disney and Bank of America in terms of total market cap. Ether, the native currency of smart-contract enabling platform ethereum, has smashed the psychologically significant barrier of $3,000.

At the time of this publication, Ethereum is trading at $3,276. The price has increased 24% over the week. The total market cap of ethereum is around $346.72 billion. It is among the top 30 assets of the world.

Ethereum is on the rise since the start of this year. It reached $2,000 on February 18th for the first time in history. Today, the coin has broken another price record.

Altcoins follow the bitcoin price surge most of the time in the crypto market. Every time the BTC price goes up, altcoin season sets in subsequently. However, ethereum is having its own price rally unaffected by Bitcoin’s market.

In the last week, bitcoin went significantly down in value. Nonetheless, ethereum kept its upward rally.

Reasons For Ethereum’s Price Rise:

Ether hits $3,000 following the growing institutional interest in the currency. Earlier, European Investment Bank announced the plan to issue digital bonds backed by the ethereum network. This will increase activity on the ethereum blockchain.

The investments in defi (Decentralised Finance) are also on the rise. As of yet, the value locked in defi has crossed $100 billion.

Ethereum network is also seeing some upgrades lately. The developers are transferring its model from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake. In this regard, ‘London’ hardfork is over the horizon. Speculators consider it the primary reason for ether’s rally towards $3,000.

The “London” upgrade will decrease the fees on the ethereum network. Moreover, the reward for miners will also diminish. Subsequently, the pressure on the sell-side of the asset will decrease.