If You Invested $1,000 In Ethereum At Launch, Here's How Much You'd Have Today

Cryptocurrency Ethereum ETH/USD is up 20% over the past week and more than 40% over the past month, but remains below the all-time highs set in 2021.

Ethereum's year-to-date gains of 7% trail other large cryptocurrencies, with many of them setting new all-time highs in 2025. Still, the second-largest crypto trades significantly higher than when it was launched in 2015. Here's a look back.

What Happened: Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin proposed the digital currency via a 2014 white paper, with the goal of adding scripting to make it easier for application development and to set up binding contracts.

Ethereum was officially launched on July 30, 2015. During its first calendar year, Ethereum traded between $0.42 and $1.39 with a starting price of around $0.74, according to SoFi. The first Ethereum transaction was carried out on Aug. 7, 2015, according to Global Data.

Ethereum gained momentum thanks to its listing on cryptocurrency platform Coinbase Global Inc. COIN. It became the second-ever cryptocurrency, after Bitcoin BTC/USD, to be listed on the platform.

Over the years, several major events and updates have occurred in Ethereum, including the fork of Ethereum 2.0 and the creation of Ethereum Classic ETC/USD.

Ethereum saw increased attention and a surge in valuation related to the boom of non-fungible tokens in 2021. Many of the NFTs were built on the Ethereum blockchain, including CryptoPunks and Bored Ape Yacht Club. A record sale of a Beeple NFT created interest in NFTs and Ethereum.

Today, Ethereum is the second most valuable cryptocurrency with a market capitalization of $431.7 billion.

Investing $1,000 in Ethereum: An investment in the second-largest cryptocurrency, the year it launched, would have generated a strong return for investors.

While it was initially more challenging to invest in Ethereum before its inclusion on major cryptocurrency exchanges, investors could purchase the cryptocurrency after its launch.

Based on a starting price of $0.74, an investor could have purchased 1,351.35 ETH at the time of launch.

The $1,000 investment in Ethereum at launch would be worth $4,824,062.74 today based on a price of $3,569.81 at the time of writing.

At its all-time high of $4,815 set in November 2021, the $1,000 investment in Ethereum at the time of launch would have been worth $6,506,750.25.

Ethereum has traded between $1,386.80 and $4,106.96 over the last 52 weeks. There is no guarantee that the cryptocurrency will return to yearly or all-time highs.

While many missed out on investing in Ethereum in the early days, the exercise shows that sometimes investing a small amount in a high-conviction idea can have a huge payout in the future.

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