Ethereum rose to a 20-month high as the approval of a Bitcoin ETF spurred altcoin gains.

Several large cryptocurrencies, including Ethereum, Solana, Cardano, etc., rallied following the approval of a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the US.

BTC’s price traded mostly unchanged following the news, up slightly by 1.35% at $46,258 at press time. Considering the hype and enthusiasm the application has generated over the past few months, this price-performance ratio is surprising.

Some analysts have predicted that the ETF approval could be a “sell the news” development. K33 Research Senior Analyst Vetle Lunde assert BTC’s price performance following rumors of the SEC’s fake ETF approval on January 9 showed that “ETF approval rehearsals favor news selling reactions.”

However, cryptocurrency analysts Michael van de Poppe chime BTC’s price could improve “with transaction flow toward ETF acceptance.” He added that this could be a cycle in which the BTC price exceeds $300,000.

Meanwhile, CryptoSlate Excluding stablecoins, the top 10 digital assets by market capitalization recorded gains of more than 4% over the past day. In particular, ETH rose 10% to over $2600, its highest since May 2022.

Likewise, the high-flying SOL token rose 4% to reclaim the $100 level, while ADA, BNB, Avalanche, XRP, and Dogecoin gained 14%, 5%, 13%, 6%, and 7% respectively.

Additionally, the overall cryptocurrency market increased 4% to $1.77 trillion.

Cleared Trail ETF with $270 Million+ Approved

The price performance of these digital assets resulted in approximately $272 million being liquidated from over 85,000 traders.

Bitcoin traders lost nearly $85 million during the reporting period, with most of the losses borne by traders who bet on bullish price movements in the top cryptocurrency, according to Coinglass data.

Conversely, Ethereum’s price surge has resulted in significant losses for short-term traders opposing the upward price movement. This group of traders lost $54 million, while long-term traders lost about $30 million.

Notably, the most substantial liquidation was Binance’s $3.81 million short position on Ethereum.

Other major assets such as Solana, XRP, and BNB also recorded liquidations amounting to $12.53 million, $3.81 million, and $793,000, respectively.

Meanwhile, traders on Binance and OKX accounted for more than $190 million in total losses during the reporting period.