On the eve of the ETH ETFs launch, scheduled for tomorrow, July 23, Ethereum celebrates its tenth anniversary today, marking a decade since the launch of its ICO.
Meanwhile, some members of the Web3 community are organizing celebrations in honor of the second-largest cryptocurrency.
Justin Drake, an official researcher at the Ethereum Foundation, was one of the most prominent voices highlighting this milestone on social media.
“Ethereum’s ICO began on July 22, 2014. At that time, ETH was sold in Bitcoin at a rate of 2000 ETH per 1 BTC, completely permissionless, without VCs, and without vested rights. Today, 1 BTC buys less than 20 ETH. Few assets have outperformed BTC in the last 10 years; even fewer have exceeded 100 times the return (…),” he stated.
As highlighted by the researcher, back then, ETH was sold at a rate of 2000 for 1 BTC. In contrast, today, 1 BTC is worth less than 20 ETH. This means an approximate increase of 100 times relative to Bitcoin’s price over the past 10 years.
It’s important to note that while today marks Ethereum’s 10th anniversary, the actual launch of its network was on July 30, 2015.
ETH Community Celebrates 10th Anniversary
Cy Li, the head of the non-profit organization called University of Ethereum, announced that the 10th anniversary of ETH will be celebrated at the EDCON 2024 event, which will take place from July 24 to 30 in Tokyo, Japan.
Additionally, Ethereum co-founder Joe Lubin, along with Vitalik Buterin and other founding members, will participate in the conference through various talks.
In San Francisco, companies related to Ethereum are also organizing a celebration in honor of ETH, commemorating the moment when its ICO began.
As mentioned, this date coincides with the launch of the Ethereum ETFs, which will start trading on the stock exchange tomorrow, July 23.
This also aligns with some significant announcements, such as Vitalik Buterin’s recent statement that artificial intelligence may soon be used to detect code errors within the Blockchain.
Ethereum and Its Decade-Long Journey
The Ethereum project began to gain traction in 2014 when Vitalik Buterin first presented it at a Bitcoin conference in Miami.
Since then, the project has gained significant momentum and was able to finance itself through its ICO, which was open from July 22 to September 2, 2014. During this period, investors received ETH in exchange for BTC, selling over two million ETH in just 24 hours.
Consequently, Ethereum was finally launched on July 30, 2015, followed by the ICO boom in 2017, thanks to the Ethereum Blockchain. Although the pioneer of ICOs was a project called Mastercoin, which first used this fundraising mechanism in July 2013.
Over the past 10 years, the Ethereum network has undergone numerous updates, with the most significant being the transition from PoW to PoS.
Ethereum’s price has also seen substantial growth during this period, rising from around $10 in January 2017 to $1400 in January of the following year.
Over the last 8 years, Ethereum has maintained its position as the second-largest cryptocurrency in the market by capitalization.
By Andrej Kovacevic
Updated on 23rd July 2024