Ethereum 2.0

Ethereum 2.0

Ethereum is a blockchain, the second most used and well-known after Bitcoin. It is also an open source platform for decentralized applications. It has its own cryptocurrency, the ether (ETH), which allows to create any other token based on its platform.

Developed by Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum is a public, open source, Blockchain-based platform that offers smart contracts. It would be a mistake to define Ethereum as a cryptocurrency or to confuse it with Ether, a cryptocurrency in the Ethereum system. Ethereum was created as a platform that has the ability for users to create programs without the involvement of intermediaries, including central servers to store information that exposes them less to abuse by intermediaries and authorities. Ethereum went live on July 30, 2015 and is the second largest currency in the market with $45 billion in market capitalization. The latest Ethereum news mainly concerns the transition to Serenity - the latest phase after Ethereum's development - as well as changing the concept of Ether mining from Proof-of-Work to Proof-of-Participation to reduce the energy cost of the process

ETH 2.0 will move the second most important cryptocurrency in the world from Proof-of-Work to Proof-of-Stake.

The release date of ETH 2.0, also known as Serenity (originally planned for a 2019 launch) has been delayed until June 2022 as a security measure to consolidate the code and protect the network from malicious attacks.With ETH 2.0, the world's second-largest cryptocurrency will move away from the energy-intensive Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus to the simpler and greener Proof-of-Stake (PoS) mechanism.

The Ethereum organization claims the upgrade will make the cryptocurrency "more scalable, more secure and more sustainable." The changes are being built by teams "from across the Ethereum ecosystem."

End of crypto mining?

The arrival of Ethereum 2.0 seems to be getting closer. It has officially announced the launch of the Kiln testnet, which will allow two consensus protocols to run simultaneously: Proof of Stake (PoS) for ETH 2.0 and Proof of Work (PoW) for ETH 1.0. For example, the developer who calls himself Superphiz (currently an Ethereum 2.0 programmer) confirmed the arrival of the "The Merge" testnet on his Twitter account. CryptoNews has previously reported on the launch of merge-devnet-4, a network that predates the current Kiln and attempted to test its various technical requirements before launch.

Kiln's launch within the developer community seems to have settled very well. Optimistic opinions abound and many believe that, after Kiln, Ethereum's growth will be "exponential" once the testing phase is approved.

This network will allow running in parallel both mining clients (PoW) as is the case of Geth and staking, such as Teku. Recall that, once The Merge is completed, PoW mining will be discontinued within Ethereum.

"Ethereum 2.0's Staking reaches the 10 million ETH locked milestone."

in the second ether stage Currently that contract - which holds all funds deposited for the purpose of staking (proof of participation) - has surpassed 10 million ETH, whose fiat money equivalent amounts to more than USD 26 billion, as can be seen in the CryptoNews Price Calculator.

Adding to this milestone is also the fact that there are currently more than 300,000 Ethereum 2.0 staking validators at work, awaiting the final arrival, with The Fusion being their starting point to begin validating transactions within the network.

These statistics seem to show that, despite the multiple delays suffered, bets for the launch by this new network are still on the rise.

The smart contract in which the ethers (ETH) of the validators of the new Ethereum 2.0 network are deposited already accounts for more than 8% of the total stock of the cryptocurrency.

Specifically, the etherscan tool shows that in the contract called "Eth2 Deposit Contract" there are 9,476,066 ETH, an amount that is equivalent to almost a tenth of the total stock of the cryptocurrency. It is also the contract with the highest value deposited in this network.

To give more dimension to the figure, it can be considered equivalent to USD 29,246,456, according to the CryptoNews price index at the time of writing.

Ethereum's gas fees represent the cost needed to get the network up and running and transacting

on the ethereum 1.0 network Gas fees are necessary to process transactions on the Ethereum network. However, with high activity, gas fees can skyrocket and transactions can fail and become more expensive over time.

Experts say Ethereum 2.0 promises to reduce network fees.