This week saw the total cryptocurrency market capitalization soar above $1.3 trillion on the back of major increases from many coins. The sentiment has also improved considerably across the board.

Bitcoin’s price managed to top the coveted $30K level – a point that we haven’t seen in 10 months. The week started relatively quiet as everyone was expecting the release of the Consumer Price Index. It’s largely used to gauge inflation in the US. Before its release, however, things took a somewhat unexpected turn, and the price shot up to $30K and remained there for a while.

The CPI came in at 5% for March, indicating that the inflation continues to slow down – for the sixth month in a row. This gave investors confidence, and the market remained seemingly strong. But this wasn’t the only major event that this week had to offer.

On April 12th, Ethereum went through the so-called Shanghai upgrade. It’s also referred to as the Shapella upgrade. Its name aside, the landmark network update finally enables validators to unstake the ETH they’ve been locking up to secure the network for years. Many predicted that this would flood the market with a tremendous supply of ETH. This wasn’t the case.

While a considerable number of ETH was unlocked, the market reacted positively. The cryptocurrency shot up to $2,100, surpassing the pivotal $2K level and leading the entire market into a fresh rally. This also caused many to think that the bear market has come to a halt.