Investor interest in ETH and stETH has increased since Ethereum Foundation member Tim Beiko suggested September 19 as the provisional launch date for the Merge. ETH investors tend to factor in bullish developments in advance, for example, ETH rallied in the three weeks leading to the London hard fork. Experts believe that the market has priced in risks and is now focusing on the upcoming positives. The Goerli testnet's planned transition to Proof-of-Stake is scheduled for August 11.
According to Celsius' lawyers, users with Earn and Borrow accounts on the platform transferred the title of their coins to the firm as per its terms of service, which means Celsius was free to use, sell, pledge, and rehypothecate those coins as it wishes. The terms claim that the firm can't use coins in custody accounts without user permission, but the lawyers are questioning whether there is any difference between crypto assets held under Custody and assets held in the Earn program. Celsius' recovery plan involves waiting for the market to turn around and using its mining operations to pay off debts.
Fedi Inc. is building a mobile app on top of its Bitcoin custody protocol Fedimint. Fedimint is a community-based Bitcoin custody protocol. It accepts bitcoin deposits and returns minted tokens that can be used off-chain to pay for goods and services or exchanged between members. The protocol provides full anonymity by using blind signatures to ensure users can't be linked to the minting process. Fedimint uses multisignature functionality to distribute wallet custody among trusted members, so users can delegate private key management to more tech-savvy users.
Blockchain infrastructure company Figment will support MEV once the network moves to Proof-of-Stake. MEV is the process where individuals who create new ETH can further profit by prioritizing certain users' transactions. Figment offers a staking service that allows retail validators to earn rewards without pledging the full 32 ETH required. It plans to leverage Ethereum's new MEV boost feature to increase user rewards by up to 50%.
The Beacon Book is a collection of perspectives from 46 researchers and implementers that worked on the Ethereum Beacon Chain. In the book, the contributors discuss their experiences, code or documentation they are particularly proud of, Eth2 bugs, and more. The book features 7 full-spread illustrations that can be minted as editional NFTs of varying exclusivity. The complete text is available in the article.
This Twitter thread discusses Polygon and its future potential. Polygon is a platform founded in 2017 designed to help Ethereum scale. It features a modular and flexible SDK that allows developers to build and connect Layer 2 infrastructures. The thread provides a breakdown of Polygon's technology, ecosystem development, DeFi protocols, NFTs/gaming, financial backers, tokenomics, and investment potential.
At least 10 of India's biggest crypto exchanges are meeting to recalibrate their plans for the industry. The country's finance minister recently confirmed that the central bank wants to prohibit cryptocurrencies. India has imposed stiff taxes on crypto and payment processors have cut off exchanges. It recently disbanded its Blockchain and Crypto Assets Council, an advocacy body that represented the industry.
The Merge will not reduce gas fees. Anyone can still run a node after the Merge. Transaction speeds will mostly remain the same. Staked ETH withdrawals will not be enabled until after the Shanghai upgrade, and they will be rate-limited for security reasons. Validators will receive liquid ETH before the Shanghai upgrade. Staking APR will increase by around 50% post-Merge. The Merge will not result in any network downtime.