The way is paved for Ethereum to reach $10,000
At the beginning of the year myself and others predicted we would see Ethereum reach $10,000 by the end of 2018. The current bear market has kept Ethereum under $1000 at this time and currently we see people calling it a bear market. Regulatory clarity has been lacking and is one of the main reasons why the big money is not flowing into crypto. For th most part the question with ICOs is whether or not the ICOs are securities. The question for Ethereum which has held it back was whether or not Ethereum is a security.
Ethereum for sure NOT a security according to SEC
The latest news is that Ethereum is not a security. This may have influenced Coinbase which just recently announced Ethereum Classic will be added. The other thing to note is that if Ethereum is not a security what does it mean for all the networks set up like Ethereum? What about Cardano? What about Tezos? What about EOS? What about Steem?
DPOS style networks are different from Ethereum which is currently Proof of Work. In addition, does this indicate that launching as POW or as some very decentralized POS is necessary for it not to be a security? I don't know for sure but so far the SEC has provided clarity on Ethereum at least which means institutional investment can flow into Ethereum.
My current thoughts and predictions
I believe the prices for the most part are determined by regulators. Regulators provide additional clarity and the prices go up. Regulators express concerns and the prices go down. Regulators crackdown and we get a "bear market" or "recession". We have seen this everywhere whether it is in China, or South Korea, or the United States. If we want to see the crypto markets as a whole to go over 1 trillion market cap this year then we should want as much support from regulators and as much clarity as we need.
- China if they unban crypto would be a huge signal for an upward trend in price.
- South Korea announcing their regulatory framework and providing clarity will be a huge signal for an upward trend in price.
- The SEC providing clarity has provided the "go ahead" signal to certain big decision makers in the United States which can result in upward pressure on the price particularly for Ethereum and Bitcoin.