Tag: ethereum

Binance US Launches High-Yield Ether Staking Service Ahead of Ethereum’s ‘Merge’ Event

Binance US, a US-based subsidiary of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, is now offering Ethereum staking with an annual percentage yield (APY) of 6 percent — a figure which is a sizable step above major competitors like Lido and Coinbase which offer 3.5 percent and 3.25 percent APY, respectively. In an announcement, Binance US said that users would be able to stake ETH through the platform at a competitively low minimum of 0.001 ETH. In order to stake ETH directly through the Ethereum network, a user would otherwise have to put up a minimum of 32 ETH.

“As the Ethereum network continues to transition towards The Merge, we are thrilled to now offer ETH staking with some of the highest APY rewards in the industry,” Binance US CEO Brian Shroder said in a press release.

Data from StakingRewards shows that the number of users staking ETH rose over figures from last month to 54,800. However, the average revenue from ETH staking was down from a high of $1.68 billion (roughly Rs. 13,400 crore) on August 13 to $937 million (roughly Rs. 7,500 crore) at the time of writing. The decrease was largely due to ETH’s decline in price from over $2,000 (roughly Rs. 1,60,000) in mid-August.

The “Merge” refers to Ethereum’s long-awaited upgrade that will combine the network’s consensus layer, known as the beacon chain, with its execution layer, which is the current Ethereum mainnet. The Merge will complete Ethereum’s transition from a proof-of-work consensus mechanism to proof of stake.

The Merge is currently expected to take place sometime between September 13 and 15. After that time, Ethereum users will be able to stake their ETH to help secure the network while earning passive ETH rewards in the process.

Users will be allowed to withdraw their staked ETH from the Ethereum network after another upgrade referred to as the “Shanghai Upgrade” which depends on the successful completion of the Merge upgrade.

Nevertheless, because of the complexity of the upcoming Merge upgrade, there is no guarantee of a smooth transition and users’ funds are subject to risks such as protracted return on the invested funds or loss of the funds in case the upgrade fails.

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FTX to Freeze Deposits, Withdrawals on Solana, Arbitrum Blockchains Amid Merge Transition

FTX crypto exchange will be briefly pausing all deposits and withdrawals of ETH and ERC-20 tokens as the Etheruem blockchain gears up to transition into its eco-friendly upgrade, named the Merge. The final Bellatrix update for this transition to complete is scheduled to start on Tuesday, September 6. The Merge is expected to arrive around September 15, if all goes well. In a bid to ensure that no transactions are lost or hit during this transition, FTX will be halting all deposits and withdrawals for at least 30 minutes on Solana, Arbitrum, as well as other blockchains.

“FTX will suspend ETH and ERC-20 token deposits and withdrawals at approximately half an hour before the Bellatrix consensus layer upgrade. It is your responsibility to understand the implications of the Merge. FTX is not liable for any losses incurred,” the company said in its blog post.

The Bahamas-based crypto exchange, which claimed to have over one million users as of February this year, has also posted an update on Twitter.

This decision from FTX comes just days after a DappRadar report had warned that stablecoins and transactions backed on the Ethereum blockchain could encounter some snags as the blockchain shifts from its energy-intensive Proof-of-Work (PoW) mining model to the energy-efficient Proof-of-Stake (PoS) mining model.

While the PoW mining model is infamous for consuming bulks of energy, PoS-supporting blockchains are termed as energy efficient.

Once the Ethereum blockchain transitions to its Merge version, its power consumption will be cut by 99.95 percent.

In the backdrop of the Merge release inching closer, OpenSea NFT marketplace recently said that it will solely support the upgraded version of the blockchain.

Earlier this month, stablecoin major Tether and Circle Pay, the issuer of USD Coin, also extended support for the Merge.

While Circle Pay has said that once the Merge has released, it will only use that version of Ethereum for the operations of USD Coin, Tether has decided to start making arrangements to support the Merge in line with its release schedule.

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OpenSea NFT Marketplace to Solely Support Ethereum’s Upgraded ‘Merge’ Version

OpenSea NFT marketplace has announced its allegiance to Ethereum’s upcoming energy-efficient upgrade called the Merge. The platform has stated that no Ethereum forks will be supported on OpenSea in order to ensure all transactions are as smooth as possible. ‘Forks’ is a technical term which is used when a blockchain network splits. OpenSea, which launched in 2017, initially started supporting NFTs that were built on the Ethereum blockchain. Presently, the platform has swelled to incubate over 80 million NFTs. Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) are digital collectibles and artworks that are backed on blockchain networks.

Ethereum’s Merge upgrade is slated for release in mid-September, its developers have hinted.

A recent DappRadar report had warned that stablecoins and transactions backed on the Ethereum blockchain could encounter some snags as the blockchain shifts from its energy-intensive Proof-of-Work (PoW) mining model to the energy-efficient Proof-of-Stake (PoS) mining model.

OpenSea posted a public alert on Twitter about its decision to support only Ethereum’s Merge version upon its release.

Earlier this month, stablecoin major Tether and Circle Pay, the issuer of USD Coin, also extended support for the Merge.

While Circle Pay has said that once the Merge has released, it will only use that version of Ethereum for the operations of USD Coin, Tether has decided to start making arrangements to support the Merge in line with its release schedule.

The Merge upgrade is expected to slash Ethereum’s power consumption by 99.95 percent, its developers had claimed in a blog post last year.

Meanwhile, the bug bounty payouts for Ethereum can now go as high as $1 million (roughly Rs. 8 crore), developers of the blockchain have said in a recent update.



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Bitcoin Drops to Three-Week Low, Falls 7.7 Percent Due to Sudden Selling

Cryptocurrencies fell sharply on Friday, with sudden selling dragging Bitcoin to a three-week low. Bitcoin fell as much as 7.7 percent to $21,404 (roughly Rs. 17,10,700) over a few minutes during the European morning, at around 0640 GMT. It recovered slightly then continued its downward trajectory to trade around $21,400 (roughly Rs. 17,10,400) at 1138 GMT, down 8.2 percent on the day.

Ether also dropped around the same time and was last down 8.8 percent at $1,685 (roughly Rs. 1,34,700).

The reason for the drop was not clear.

“It’s not showing the pattern of a flash crash, as the assets didn’t immediately rebound sharply but sank even lower in the hours that followed,” said Susannah Streeter, senior investment and markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.

“It seems likely that this was as a result of a large sale transaction.”

Streeter said it appeared the cryptocurrency Cardano had been the first to move, followed by Bitcoin and Ether, and then others such as the altcoin Dogecoin.

Cryptocurrencies have fallen dramatically so far this year, as US Federal Reserve rate hikes and ultra-high inflation prompt investors to ditch riskier assets.

Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at Oanda, said Bitcoin’s failure to recover its losses “suggests there is substance to the move”.

Such sharp moves are common in the highly volatile cryptocurrency market. On June 15, Bitcoin plunged more than 15 percent as investors were spooked by the collapse of a so-called stablecoin, TerraUSD, and a major crypto lender freezing customer withdrawals.

Friday’s move put Bitcoin on track for its worst day since the June meltdown.

“Speculating in cryptocurrencies is extremely high risk and is not suitable for the vast majority of people,” Hargreaves Lansdown’s Streeter said.

© Thomson Reuters 2022

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Coinbase Prime Now Allows Institutional Investors to Stake Ether Among Other Options

Institutional clients of Coinbase Prime based in the US will now be able to stake ETH on the platform, with funds secured in the firm’s cold storage vault. Staking allows investors to earn a yield on their cryptocurrencies by committing them to a pool of assets, which helps support the liquidity and operations of a blockchain ecosystem. The offering allows another avenue for financial institutions who wish to enter the crypto space but are unsure of how to do it.

Aaron Schnarch, Vice President of Product, Custody, stated in a blog post, “We’re launching Ethereum staking to US domestic institutional clients on Coinbase Prime. Using our industry-leading cold storage, clients can now generate yield by staking ETH.”

Coinbase Prime aims to provide an end-to-end staking experience to its clients. They can create a wallet and make decisions on how much they want to stake. Also, they can initiate staking from the ETH asset page from their Coinbase prime account.

In order to secure users’ staked ETH and yield, Coinbase Prime will lock withdrawal keys in their cold storage custody vault during the entire staking process.

Furthermore, the transactions will first go through a consensus, and only then and then it will be executed. The reason behind this is to provide an additional layer of security to client accounts.

That said, the practice isn’t without risks. Staking often requires investors to store their funds with a third party known as a “custodian,” who, in some cases, technically owns the funds while they are being staked. Earlier this year, investors saw billions wiped away as custodians like Voyager and Celsius went bankrupt in response to the collapse of TerraUSD.

At present, Ethereum is transitioning from a proof-of-work to a proof-of-stake blockchain system, meaning that both validation processes are running concurrently. Known as “The Merge”, the transition is expected to happen in September, at which point Ethereum mining will be phased out.

Coinbase Prime also allows staking for cryptocurrencies such as Solana, Polkadot, Cosmos, Tezos, Celo, and others.

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Ethereum’s ‘Merge’ Upgrade Gears Up for Final Testnet Check Starting August 4, Details Here

After passing through rigorous devnets, shadow forks, and other kinds of tech tests, Ethereum’s eco-friendly upgrade is finally close to its roll-out. Called the ‘Merge’, this network will transition on the final testnet, Goerli. The testing, which begins on August 4, will go through more tech checks between August 6 and August 12. The information was shared by Merge developer, Tim Beiko, on Thursday, July 28. Once complete, the Merge upgrade will slash Ethereum blockchain’s power requirements by 99.95 percent.

“The following client releases support the Merge across the Goerli and Prater testnets. Node operators must run both an execution and consensus layer client to remain on the network during and after the Merge,” Ethereum developers said in a blog post.

Ethereum developers are recoding its mining protocol to the energy efficient ‘Proof-of-Stake’ (PoS) model from its current ‘Proof-of-Work’ (PoW) system.

Once switched to PoS mining operations, randomly selected miners will be able to validate transactions on the Ethereum blockchain, eliminating the requirement of dedicated machines and people to add new blocks and hence reducing Ethereum’s energy demands.

The developers are running extensive tests on the Ethereum revamp because decentralised finance (DeFi) apps reportedly worth over $100 billion (roughly Rs. 7,61,110 crore) are supported on the blockchain, and cannot be risked.

As for now, the release of the Merge is tentatively slated for September 19.

Earlier this month, the Merge successfully completed a trial on the public test network called Sepolia. This marked its second-to-last trial test.

In the backdrop of Merge inching closer to its release, ETH prices have soared on the crypto charts.

As per Gadgets 360’s crypto price tracker, ETH is currently trading at $1,687 (roughly Rs. 1.35 lakh).

ETH prices are up 47 percent over the past fortnight, but still 66 percent down from its last all-time high of $4,700 (roughly Rs. 3.47 lakh) that was achieved for the first-time last November.



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Ethereum Whale Addresses Rise Sharply as ETH Moves Back Up to $1,500

The announcement of the anticipated upgrade, The Merge, on the Ethereum network made positive impact on its native asset ETH as well as its staked derivative on Lido finance called staked Ether (stETH) and that has resulted in an increase in the number of whales too. Last Thursday, Ethereum Foundation member Tim Beiko suggested September 19 as the provisional launch date for The Merge, which will see the Ethereum network transition from the energy-intensive proof-of-work consensus mechanism to a more environment-friendly proof-of-stake mechanism.

As per on-chain analysis provider Santiment, the so-called whales — holding between 1,000 to 100,000 ETH — had seen a sharp increase in the past few weeks after bottoming in May, which halted a months-long negative streak.

More precisely, there were 131 new such wallets emerging until Sunday, with the total number briefly exceeding 6,666. The trend is similar with smaller Ether investors too with those holding at least a full one has charted an all-time high of over 1.5 million. Addresses with 100 or more coins, on the other hand, are up to a 15-month high of more than 45,000.

Meanwhile, the price of Ether has surged by close to 40 percent too climbing from the $1,050 (roughly Rs. 84,015) price range to $1,526 (roughly Rs. 1.22 lakh) at the time of publishing. A few days before the shadow fork went live, ETH had plummeted to around $1,000 (roughly Rs. 80,015), and the community feared another drop below that line. However, the hype didn’t allow such a dip, and the second-largest crypto went on a roll.

The highly anticipated upgrade in the Ethereum network, The Merge is expected to make the successful transition of blockchain from its current proof-of-work consensus mechanism to proof-of-stake. Additionally, this would also bring some cutting-edge features in terms of high transaction speed, low gas fees and scalability.

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Axie Infinity’s Ronin Network Returns on Track After Losing $625 Million in Hack Attack

Axie Infinity, the popular blockchain gaming platform, has finally restored its Ethereum-linked sidechain called the Ronin Network three months after it suffered a major breach. The Ronin Network, designed by Axie Infinity developer Sky Mavis, acts as a bridge between the video game and the blockchain, allowing cryptocurrencies to be transferred in and out of the game. In March, a hack attack on this bridge depleted a whopping $625 million (roughly Rs. 4,729 crore) from the gaming company.

Now that Ronin Network is up and running again, gamers will be able to facilitate crypto withdrawals and deposits in the game via this Ethereum bridge.

Axie Infinity officially announced the development on Twitter while revealing that the Ronin Network has undergone internal as well as external audits before its re-launch.

“Following the Ronin exploit in March, Sky Mavis conducted a full reassessment alongside independent auditors Certik and Verichains. These audits enabled us to identify and implement a number of opportunities for improvement,” Axie Infinity wrote in a blog post.

Going forward, the firm has also implemented some governance upgrades to the Ronin Network to make it more secure against suspicious actors.

“The governance process will be conducted via a decentralised voting mechanism. The governors will be empowered to vote for changes such as: adding/removing validators, upgrade contracts, change thresholds, etc. The governance voting method is serial by design: only one governance vote can be held at a time, and that vote must be completed before moving to a new vote,” the blog noted.

In a bid to tackle risks of a hack attack, Ronin Bridge now has a set daily withdrawal limit of $50 million (roughly Rs. 395 crore) which will be reset every 24 hours.

If the limit is hit early in the day, it can be reset by an administrator.

173,600 ETH tokens and 25.5 million USD Coins were drained from the Ronin bridge on March 29, 2022. Sky Mavis and Axie Infinity committed to covering all users’ funds.

The attack was identified after a user was unable to withdraw Ether tokens from the Ronin bridge.

So far in 2022, cyber criminals have stolen $1.7 billion (roughly Rs. 13,210 crore) in digital assets with Decentralised Finance (DeFi) protocols accounting for 97 percent of the total, a report by Chainalysis had recently claimed.

Crypto research firm Chainalysis has recently established a special hotline for people to flag potential hacks in the sector.

In a blog-post titled ‘Crypto Incident Response’, Chainalysis said that hackers caused thefts and damages of up to $3 billion (roughly Rs. 23,486 crore) from 251 attacks in 2021.

“That’s why today we’re launching Crypto Incident Response, a rapid response service for organisations that have been targeted by a cyber-attack or unauthorised network intrusion that involves a cryptocurrency theft or demand,” the research firm wrote in its post.



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Bitcoin Drops Below $20,000 as Crypto Selloff Quickens

The price of Bitcoin fell below $20,000 (roughly Rs. 15 lakh) for the first time since late 2020 on Saturday, in a fresh sign that the selloff in cryptocurrencies is deepening.

Bitcoin, the most popular cryptocurrency, fell below the psychologically important threshold, dropping as much as 9 percent to less than $19,000 (roughly Rs. 14 lakh), according to CoinDesk.

The last time Bitcoin was at this level was November 2020, when it was on its way up to its all-time high of nearly $69,000 (roughly Rs. 53 lakh).

Bitcoin has now lost more than 70 percent of its value since reaching that peak.

Ethereum, another widely followed cryptocurrency that’s been sliding in recent weeks, took a similar tumble on Saturday.

It’s the latest sign of turmoil in the cryptocurrency industry amid wider turbulence in financial markets. Investors are selling off riskier assets because central banks are raising interest rates to combat quickening inflation.

A spate of crypto meltdowns have erased tens of billions of dollars of investors’ assets and sparked urgent calls to regulate the freewheeling industry.

Cryptocurrency lending platform Celsius Network said this month it was pausing all withdrawals and transfers, with no sign of when it would give its 1.7 million customers access to their funds.

Stablecoin Terra imploded last month, erasing tens of billions of dollars in a matter of hours.

Cryptocurrency is an unregulated digital currency, not a legal tender and subject to market risks. The information provided in the article is not intended to be and does not constitute financial advice, trading advice or any other advice or recommendation of any sort offered or endorsed by NDTV. NDTV shall not be responsible for any loss arising from any investment based on any perceived recommendation, forecast or any other information contained in the article.

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Ethereum Update Set to Undergo Ropsten Testnet, Completion to Mark Readiness of ‘Merge’

The eco-friendly upgrade to the Ethereum blockchain is gearing up to undergo the Ropsten Beacon Chain testnet, one of the longest-existing proof-of-work (PoW) testnet. Basically, the Ropsten testnet is the most popular replica of the Ethereum network. It is capable of imitating the aspects of the ETH mainnet, making it a test model of what Ethereum’s upgraded PoS network may work like. The new Ethereum network is named the ‘The Merge’. This recode will cut Ethereum’s carbon emissions by a substantial amount.

“Client teams are now ready to run Ropsten – the oldest proof-of-work testnet – through The Merge. In preparation, a Ropsten Beacon Chain has been launched to provide consensus to the network. The Ropsten network, which is intended to be deprecated after The Merge, will run through the upgrade earlier in the development process than previous network upgrades,” said an official blog from Ethereum developers.

Tim Beiko, one of the developers of The Merge, shared the milestone announcement on Twitter. He revealed that The Merge is expected to go under this beacon chain testnet around June 8.

The release of The Merge is expected to be ready by August this month.

Before that happens, two more testnets will be run through Ethereum 2.0 in a bid to ensure appropriate transaction execution.

Meanwhile, back in April, The Merge developers successfully stress-tested the network using a so-called mainnet shadow fork.

At the time, another Ethereum developer Marius Van Der Wijden had called this a “huge success”.

The developers are running extensive tests on the Ethereum revamp because decentralised finance (DeFi) apps reportedly worth over $100 billion (roughly Rs. 7,61,110 crore) are supported on the blockchain, and cannot be put in jeopardy.

The PoS mining operations use randomly selected miners to validate transactions. This cuts its energy consumption requirement, reducing its carbon emission.

The developers are running extensive tests on the Ethereum revamp because decentralised finance (DeFi) apps reportedly worth over $100 billion (roughly Rs. 7,61,110 crore) are supported on the blockchain, and cannot be put in jeopardy.



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