Crypto influencer warns Ethereum fees will drive users away

Prominent crypto influencer Lark Davis, or “The Crypto Lark,” has warned that Ethereum’s competitors will continue to syphon away users should Eth2 fail to launch soon amid ever-increasing gas fees.

Despite predicting five-figure Ether prices in 2021, Davis’ Feb. 19 video, Davis asserts Ethereum’s skyrocketing fees has meant that only “rich investors” can afford to the network, prompting smaller users to switch to competitors like Binance Smart Chain (BSC).

Davis noted BSC is currently enjoying a surge in popularity, with volumes for BSC-based DApps catching up to their Ethereum-based rivals.

Describing the current gas fees prices as “totally loco,” Davis urged Ethereum’s developers to expedite the launch of Eth2 in response to the skyrocketing to prevent a further exodus of users to cheaper alternatives:

“But we’re now to the point where ETH 1.0 – oh we need ETH 2.0 so soon, come on Vitalik, get it going, man – ETH 1.0, most regular users are priced out of using the majority of applications on Ethereum. […] A transaction on Uniswap costs $50 on average these days and that is just crazy.”

Eth2’s Phase 0 was launched in December 2020, allowing Ethereum users to lock up their Ether for staking. Robust scaling capabilities are slated for activation with Eth2’s launch of Phase 1, which is expected to introduce sharding toward the end of 2021 at the earliest.

Average Ethereum transaction prices have skyrocketed to their highest ever levels of around $30 according to Bitinfocharts.com. At the time of the crypto market flash crash in late trading on Monday, Feb. 22, the average gas fee was as high as $50.