Ethereum Merge, potential forks and exchange listing: Where will ETH price go next?

Crypto markets anticipate ETH forks heading into Merge

Ethereum price has been at the center of speculation for quite some time due to the upcoming Merge update. As a result, there have been forecasts of what the future could hold, not just for users, but also from a miners’ perspective. 

Some predict that the ETH main chain might undergo a split, where one chain retains the Proof-of-Work (PoW) hashing algorithm and the other proceeds with the Proof-of-Stake (PoS). The most recent update includes the listing of ETH PoW blockchain on exchanges. The ETHW ticker, owned by Justin Sun, is a PoW fork that has been listed on the Poloniex exchange. 

Following Poloniex’s lead, BitMEX listed the PoW chain under the ticker - ETHPOWZ22. This is essentially a ETH PoW futures contract tradable using ERC20 Tether as margin, and giving users a 2X leveraged exposure.

With the Merge update scheduled to take effect on September 19, altcoins related to the ETH ecosystem are experiencing massive volatility.

Ethereum price wants to test its strength

Ethereum price is trying to make a comeback and is currently retesting the $1,730 resistance level, which coincides with the 100-day EMA. It is trading under a cluster of resistance levels at a make-or-break moment for ETH. A breakout will result in an explosive move to $2,147, aka the 200-day EMA.

This scenario, however, is heavily reliant on the price action of trend-setting crypto Bitcoin. If BTC bulls fail to push the price past the $24,565 resistance level, it could result in a less optimistic outcome for ETH price.

ETH/USDT 1-day chart

On the other hand, if Ethereum price gets rejected at $1,730 of its own accord or due to the influence of Bitcoin price, it will likely confirm the presence of bears. In such a case, ETH could slide lower and fill the four-hour price inefficiency at $1,446.