Ethereum hits $20 million worth of shorts

Ethereum, the leading smart contract layer-1 blockchain, has gained 3.2% in the last 24 hours. ETH touched an intraday high of $3,514 earlier today and is currently trading at $3,488. Liquidity of initial traders seems to be the key factor driving the change in Ethereum price.

A total of $20.4 million worth of ETH shorts were released in the past 24 hours, which is more than the $1.87 million worth of ETH longs that were released during the same period, according to derivatives analytics platform Coinglass.

A short is a derivative contract that traders use to compete with the price of an asset. And the longer the time frame used by traders, the higher the value of the underlying asset.

Another key event that market participants are watching closely is the approval of US spot Ethereum ETFs.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has asked Ethereum ETF issuers to submit updated documents by July 8, according to Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg.

This suggests that spot Ethereum ETFs may begin trading in mid-July. Initially, analysts speculated that the Ethereum spot EFAs would be approved on July 2 – but that now seems highly unlikely.

SEC Chairman Gary Gensler previously stated that spot Ethereum ETFs would be allowed sometime in the summer. At the Bloomberg Investment Conference, Gensler said the approval process is going smoothly.

To attract institutional investors, some ETF issuers such as VanEyck and Franklin Templeton have already announced fee freezes for their positions in Ethereum.

ETH is not the only asset that has witnessed an increase in its value. The total cryptocurrency market capitalization increased 3.6% in the last 24 hours and is approaching $2.5 trillion, according to CoinGecko.

This is due to the loss of $81 million worth of shorts across all assets in the last 24 hours. That's only offset by an estimated $17 million in long-term losses over the same period.

LayerZero and Ethereum Name Service were the top earners per 100 coins as they recorded gains of 27% and 24% respectively. Caspa, on the other hand, was the only coin trading to lose more than 1 percent. Caspa is down 4 percent in the last 24 hours.

Edited by Stacy Elliott.