Ethereum then and now: 10 years later – London Business News | Londonlovesbusiness.com

Ethereum is arguably the most pivotal event that has ever happened within the blockchain and cryptocurrency communities. It has changed not just the very face of the industry but also reimagined the very notion of what was thought of as the capabilities of a decentralized technology. Over these 10 years, Ethereum went from an ambitious startup to one of the key platforms for developing decentralized applications and smart contracts. Interest in it doesn’t fade, and many investors, considering prospects long-term, choose exchange strategies like XMR to ETH in order to use the growing potential of the platform. But what did Ethereum look like 10 years ago, and what has changed in this time?

1. The beginning of the journey: Creating Ethereum

Because, in 2013, young programmer Vitalik Buterin gave a presentation about creating Ethereum-a decentralized platform that would support smart contracts. If Bitcoin concerned itself only with the aspect of transaction and storage of value, Ethereum was supposed to be more flexible and grant the possibility to developers to build their own applications upon it. Smart contracts let a lot of processes get automated without any brokers being involved.

In 2015, the Ethereum network was launched, and from that moment on, its rapid development took hold. At the time, very few really understood the potential hidden in the platform, but even then it became clear that Ethereum opened new opportunities for programmers, business, and finance.

2. Early difficulties and growth

The road for Ethereum at its initial stages of existence went through: scalability issues and high fees for transactions. In 2016, one of the most high-profile attacks against the Ethereum blockchain became so-called DAO hack, which took away users’ money. As a result of this DAO hack, the network was divided into two parts: Ethereum and Ethereum Classic (ETC).

However, despite these problems, the developers didn’t stop perfecting the network. Already in 2017, the platform began to grow strongly due to the start of the rise of the cryptocurrency market and developments in the decentralized finance ecosystem, where Ethereum became the foundation. With the emergence of many decentralized applications, tokens, and exchange platforms, the very structure of the financial world has changed.

3. Ethereum now: The dominant platform

Nowadays, Ethereum is one of the largest cryptocurrencies in the world, second only to Bitcoin in terms of capitalization. Yet, the influence it has far surpasses its part as just a cryptocurrency: Ethereum is an ecosystem supporting thousands of projects-from NFTs to DeFi.

Probably the biggest ones were the upgrade of the network to Ethereum 2.0, which started in 2020. Moving from Proof of Work to Proof of Stake made the network much greener and more scalable. All this allows Ethereum to cope with the growing number of users and transactions, which in turn is making this cryptocurrency more viable for long-term investments and business applications.

The network is actively developing, and already, such areas as DeFi, NFTs, and many other applications are built on it, changing the approach to various industries. Many leading companies and corporations begin to exploit Ethereum more actively with the aim of resolving business issues.

4. Institutional investments and recognition

As the Ethereum ecosystem keeps expanding, more and more institutional investors are starting to invest in ETH. Banks, investment funds, and even governments have begun to trust Ethereum as a future platform wherein financial and business transactions could be underpinned. According to many experts, over the coming years, Ethereum is going to play a key base role in worldwide financial systems and decentralized applications able to substitute traditional financial mechanisms.

5. Future of Ethereum

Ethereum stays, 10 years from its launch, as a force for incredible innovation, changing the world. Technical enhancements on the path of further scalability, including Layer-2 ecosystems, will be able to see the growth of the network and economic impact on the world’s economy increase.