ethereum

Ethereum’s London hard fork to launch soon.

KEY INSIGHTS:

  • Ethereum’s much-awaited London hard fork is most probable to launch on 4 August.

  • It will launch on the Rinkeby testnet at block 12965000, and kick off in the EIP-1559 upgrade. 

  • The final hard fork launch date was determined after activating on the Goerli and Ropsten testnets. 

  • Update of the current protocol consists of 5 Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs), most remarkably EIP-3554 and EIP-1559.

Ethereum’s much-anticipated London hard fork is most probable to launch on 4 August, between the time frame of 13:00 UTC (6:30 p.m. IST) and 17:00 UTC (10:30 p.m. IST). It will launch on the Rinkeby testnet at block 12965000, and kick off in the EIP-1559 upgrade.ethereum

Tim Beiko, an Ethereum developer, tweeted about the update concerning the testnet and confirmed the installation of the code to all three testnets. Earlier, it was set to launch by the end of July.

The final hard fork launch date was determined after activating on the Goerli, Ropsten and Rinkeby testnets.

Update of the current protocol consists of 5 Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs), most remarkably EIP-3554 and EIP-1559, that intend to counter many inadequacies, such as:

  • EIP 1559 aims at making Ethereum less inflationary by offering a new fee structure. This update is extremely disputed as it works towards burning part of the fee, thereby reducing revenue of miners.
  • EIP 3554 puts off difficulty bomb of Ethereum to 1 December. This strategy will increase miners’ toil on the Ethereum network, successfully freezing PoW in planning for Ethereum’s shift to PoS.

“As a side effect of a more predictable base fee, EIP-1559 may lead to some reduction in gas prices if we assume that fee predictability means users will overpay for gas less frequently.”

-Consensys

As stated by Ethereum software solutions company ConsenSys, as more and more settlements take place, the burning of the base fee will have more deflationary pressure on the general supply of Ethereum.

This major upgrade is happening amidst the news of Ethereum’s total hash rate declining by 19% in the past month, as reported by analytics site Etherscan.io.

Recently, in a note to investors, analysts of the well-known leading American investment management firm – Goldman Sachs – have reasoned how Ethereum could surpass Bitcoin in terms of a better store of value. According to them, Ethereum presently is the digital asset with the most real-world-use potential, as it is the most known platform for generating smart contracts.

As of 16.12 hours IST on 9 July, Ethereum is currently trading at $2,093.54 down 3.96%, according to data provided by coinmarketcap. Volatility is at its peak.

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