The price of Ether is soaring today, heading back towards record highs as broader acceptance (UK’s IG Group offer ETH trading), government discussions (ETH founder meets with Thai central bank), and perhaps most of all fork-related buying (ETH faces hard fork and traders are betting on BTC-like reaction).

Ether is surging today, heading back towards its $400 record highs from mid-June.

There appears three main drivers of this most recent move:

First, the Ethereum Developer team has just released word that the Metropolis hard fork is set to occur in late September of this year, and we suspect crypto traders are buying in anticipation of a Bitcoin-like reaction post-fork. As CoinTelegraph reports,

The hard fork has been widely anticipated after the Ethereum road map for 2017 was released earlier this year. The map indicated that the coming release would contain some major upgrades for the platform. The announcement earlier in the year indicated a three to six-month window for release, and late September is right on the cusp of a full six months. While the timing is later than many had hoped, the news is a welcome encouragement for those seeking Ethereum upgrades.

The new hard fork should enable some significant upgrades.

• First, increasing anonymity will come with new ‘zk-SNARKs,’ or Zero-knowledge proofs. Users will be able to perform anonymous transactions at higher levels than in the past.
• Second, programming and smart contracts will be made far easier with the new upgrade, relieving some of the pressure on current programmers. Gas will also be adjusted for bill settling.
• Third, masking for security enthusiasts will allow users to determine the address for which they have a private key. This will increase security on the network, even against quantum computer hacking.
• Finally, the upgrade includes a ‘Difficulty-Bomb’ intended to make mining exponentially more difficult.

It remains unclear whether the upgrade will cause prices to increase or decrease. As mining slows, the price may fall. However, the upgrades should increase the amount of users on the system overall, causing the price to rise.