Solana hits all time-high, Ether rises above $4,000 on path back to record for the crypto

The price rallies of ether and Solana, which are both smart-contract blockchains that allow developers to build applications on the networks, were partly driven by the explosive growth of decentralized finance, or DeFi, protocols and nonfungible tokens, according to several analysts. 

For bitcoin BTCUSD, +0.56%, exchange balances are falling again, which is usually viewed as a bullish sign, Matthew Blom, global head of sales and trading at crypto exchange EQONEX, wrote in a Thursday note.

Ether’s price ETHUSD, +0.07% surge could also be attributed to Ethereum’s recent “London hard fork” upgrade, which includes Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 1559, analysts say. The changes aim to alter the way transaction fees, or “gas fees,” are calculated, and have been reducing ether’s supply.

“The recent market rebound has also fuelled speculations of an upswing in ether tokens, with increased trading volumes fuelling the price action,” Pavel Shkitin, CEO of cryptocurrency exchange Nominex wrote in an email to MarketWatch recently. “As a result, we will most likely have a speculative rise in the price of ether.”