Ethereum price analysis: ETH/USD back above $500, but recovery stalled

ETH/USD is trading at $516 at the time of writing, unchanged since the beginning of the day and 45 higher in recent 24 hours. After a spike late on Monday, the second largest digital coin entered a consolidation phase marginally above critical $500.00 handle. Current market capitalization is $51.8B and average trading volumes $1.5B, unchanged since Monday. ETH/USD represents 24% of all ETH transactions with the coin most actively traded at Bitfinex.

Meanwhile, big changes are coming to Ethereum network, where the developers are about to introduce Casper protocol and sharding, possibly within one update. Casper will increase the network efficiency, while sharding solves scalability issues, increasing the number of processed transactions.

Ethereum technical picture

ETH/USD failed to gain strong bullish momentum above critical $500 level, which might mean that the downside may be resumed soon. The next local resistance is seen at $530. This area has capped the recovey attempts since June 14. If it is cleared, the upside may be extended towards $550 with 100-SMA (4-hour chart) currently at $549. On the downside, the support is created by $500-$490 area with 200-SMA at $583. Once it is broken, the selling pressure will take the coin to $460 (June 13 low). 

ETH/USD, 4-hour chart