The price of 0x (ZRX) has hit a two-year price high amidst hopes that falling Ethereum fees will lead to greater decentralized exchange usage. 

According to CryptoCompare data, the Ethereum-powered open protocol 0x has reached its highest price since October 2018, surging more than 40% on Friday to $0.97.  It has since corrected to $0.72 at press time.

The price jump for ZRX follows just days after stablecoin issuer Tether announced plans for launching a USDT token on the OMG Network, taking a significant amount of strain off the ethereum blockchain. 0x investors are hopeful the decrease in ethereum network usage will lead to falling gas fees, which reached a record high of $6 last week, thereby spurring greater interest in decentralized exchanges. 

0x enables the peer-to-peer exchange of assets on Ethereum’s blockchain and allows users to access a variety of decentralized financial instruments. However, the protocol is limited by network congestion on ethereum, with high fees leading to an overall reduction in investor activity. 

Denis Vinokourov, head of research for crypto prime broker Bequant, told CoinDesk:

Any reduction in ETH transaction costs due to tether’s migration on the OMG network is a huge win for DEX trading.

Vinokourov pointed to the surge in price for other DEX coins, including Aave’s LEND which is up 3,000% year-to-date. The research head speculated that 0x may still have plenty of ground to cover despite the recent price jump. 

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