Ethereum Whitepaper Celebrated 12th Anniversary, Price Stands Above $3,000 on November 27

The Ethereum whitepaper reached its 12th anniversary on November 27, the date Vitalik Buterin published the document that introduced smart contract functionality to blockchain technology. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong acknowledged the milestone in a post on X.

Armstrong stated that Ethereum changed the crypto industry by providing builders with advanced tools, including a Turing-complete programming language. He credited Buterin, the Ethereum co-founders, and the community for enabling products that define the current state of the sector.

Buterin published “A Next-Generation Smart Contract and Decentralized Application Platform” on November 27, 2013, at age 19. The whitepaper proposed a blockchain with built-in programming capability that would allow developers to write code of arbitrary complexity directly onto the chain.

Bitcoin’s scripting language was intentionally limited for security purposes and creates a technical barrier for developers attempting to build applications on top of it. Buterin’s proposal offered an alternative by allowing smart contracts that could execute automatically based on predetermined conditions.

has survived the DAO hack, transitioned from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake consensus, and established infrastructure for decentralized finance, non-fungible tokens, and decentralized autonomous organizations. The platform currently holds a market capitalization exceeding $365 billion.

Historical data highlights how Ethereum’s price has shifted each year on November 27. In 2020, ETH traded near $590, before soaring to about $4,300 on the same date in 2021 at the peak of the bull market. By November 27, 2022, the price had fallen to roughly $1,160 amid the broader crypto downturn.

The market began recovering in 2023, with ETH climbing back to around $2,060, and then rising further to over $3,450 on November 27, 2024. This year, Ethereum hovered around the $3,000 mark, slightly below last year’s level but still significantly higher than earlier years.

Armstrong’s statement highlighted that many products driving the current industry would not exist without the vision mentioned in Buterin’s original whitepaper. The Turing-complete language enabled developers to create complex applications that extend far beyond simple value transfer.