- ETH/USD is range-bound with bearish pressure.
- The critical support is located at $150.00.
ETH/USD has retreated from the recent high of $152.14 reached on Sunday, following the successful Istanbul upgrade. The second-largest coin with the current market capitalization of $16.2 billion has stayed unchanged on a day-to-day basis and lost over 1% of its value since the beginning of Monday.
Istanbul scare is over
Istanbul has become the third major update of the Ethereum network in 2019 and the eighth update throughout the history of the project. It implemented several major improvements, including compatibility with PoW (Proof-of-Work) based cryptocurrencies like Zcash, scalability of zero-knowledge technologies and DDoS resistance. The 9,069,000 was found by mining pool SparkPool.
However, the process was not as smooth as one might have hoped for. Parity implemented last-minute fixes ahead of the fork and urged all Parity client users to patch their software before Istanbul arrived. While the issues were easy to implement, the might have caused serious problems, including double-spending, if someone had failed to install the patch in time.
Ethereum’s technical picture
Looking technically, ETH/USD recovery is capped by the middle line of the daily Bollinger Band located above $151.00. Once it is out of the way, the upside is likely to gain traction with the next focus on $159.40 (the lower boundary of the previous consolidation range) and psychological $160.00. ETH bulls might have a hard time clearing this area as it has served as a strong resistance since the end of November. A move above will attract new buyers to the market and help improve the near-term outlook.
On the downside, the strong support area is created by Sunday’s low at $146.50. Once it is out of the way, the sell-off may continue towards psychological $140.00 and $137.75 ( the lower line of the daily Bollinger Band.
ETH/USD, the daily chart
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