Ethereum tops $2,000 as network approaches merger event

Ethereum (ETH) continued its bull run, reclaiming the $2,000 level late Friday night for the first time since May, according to data from CoinMarketCap.
The No. 2 cryptocurrency by market capitalization was up to $2,01[ads1]4 at the time of writing, up 7% in the past 24 hours and 17% in the past week. It has almost doubled in the last month.
More than $152 million in card games on Ethereum have been liquidated in the last 24 hours, according to data from Coinglass. And 13.2 million ETH has been staked on Ethereum 2.0, a new all-time high for the metric, according to data from Beacon scan.
What is pumping ETH?
It’s all about the merger.
Earlier this week, the Goerli testnet completed its transition to a proof-of-stake mining mechanism, the last dress rehearsal (after successful testnet merges on Sepolia and Ropsten) before the mainnet merge now expected on September 15th or 16th.
Testnett is a development version of Ethereum that allows developers to experiment before launch.
The Ethereum network’s shift from an energy-intensive proof-of-work (PoW) mechanism to a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus algorithm should improve overall network efficiency and reduce energy consumption by up to 99%.
The upgrade is also expected to lower Ethereum’s skyrocketing transaction costs, although some doubt that post-merger Ethereum will look as idyllic as some of the network’s core developers have promised.