The price of Ether , the native cryptocurrency of Ethereum, has surpassed $547. Following the breakout, traders are pinpointing several key resistance levels in the near term.

In the short term, traders generally foresee $600 as the major resistance area for Ether as it marked the beginning of a bearish trend starting in May 2018. As such, $600 could act as an area of interest for sellers. 

But, traders also believe that if Ether surpasses $600, it would likely enter the $700 to $900 range. Above it, there is little resistance until the all-time high.

The Ethereum network has seen numerous catalysts come into play in recent months.

First, the Ethereum 2.0 network upgrade is progressing, as a large number of Ether continues to flow into the deposit contract address.

Ethereum 2.0 is a significant upgrade to move Ethereum from the proof-of-work (PoW) consensus algorithm to the proof-of-stake (PoS) algorithm. Essentially, it removes miners from the network to optimize the settlement of transactions.

Second, on-chain data show that whales are continuing to accumulate Ether. This trend coincides with a drop in Ether exchange reserves, particularly as more holders deposit the digital asset to the Eth2 deposit contract. Researchers at Santiment wrote when Ether initially broke out of $500:

“Following in $BTC's footsteps, $ETH has hit a 29-month high of $509. June 21, 2018 was the last time the price was this high for the #2 market cap asset. #Ethereum's top 10 holders rising, combined with coin supply on exchanges, have fueled this rally.”