Ethereum

According to new data, over half of the blocks on the Ethereum network now reportedly comply with the US Treasury OFAC’s standards. This comes roughly a month after the platform’s monumental merge update. Phasing Out Tornado Cash The Office of Foreign Assets Control is the intelligence and enforcement agency of the US  Treasury Department. Indeed, the OFAC administers and enforces US  financial sanctions. A prime example of this is the recent, highly-publicized ban on crypto mixer Tornado Cash.  According to…

BNY Mellon – the oldest bank in the United States – just became the first to begin offering crypto custody services for its clients.  The custodian will now protect users’ cryptocurrencies alongside their traditional investments on its platform.  A Bank Adopts Bitcoin According to the Wall Street Journal, the bank partnered with the established crypto custodian Fireblocks to offer the service. The latter serves institutional clients and has hired former SEC chairman Jay Clayton as an advisor. The service is…

With Ethereum’s long-anticipated Merge finally complete, the network’s miners may have already found a new home in Ethereum Classic. The original Ethereum chain saw its hash rate explode following Thursday’s monumental upgrade.  Inheriting Ethereum’s Miners According to data from 2Miners, Ethereum Classic’s hashrate is now up to 305.65 terrahashes per second (TH/s). On late Wednesday, it stood at just 80 TH/s.  For context, 1 terrahash is equal to 1 000 000 000 000 hashes. These are guess answers generated by…

With the Ethereum Merge only days away, crypto analysis company CoinGecko has looked into which countries are most interested in the imminent upgrade. According to CoinGecko reports, Singaporean crypto holders lead several others in terms of interest in Ethereum’s imminent historic milestone. Singapore’s "ETH Merge” Searches Eclipse US, Canada Ethereum’s dev team has confirmed that the network’s shift to the Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism will occur between September 13 and 15. As the upgrade has been in the works for years,…

The Nitro upgrade for Ethereum layer-2 scaling solution Arbitrum is slated to take place on Wednesday, August 31. Arbitrum shared updates regarding the forthcoming upgrade in a Twitter post late last night.  Arbitrum Announces Nitro Launch Date The Ethereum-based scaling solution employs L2 structure, optimistic rollups to process transactions outside the Ethereum mainnet. Arbitrum completes operations in large batches off-chain before delivering them on Ethereum. With Nitro, however, the network should raise its transaction throughput and cut down transaction fees.…

Coinbase – America’s largest cryptocurrency exchange – has updated its statement detailing its approach to Ethereum’s upcoming Merge. The firm has now clarified that it's willing to list a possible forked version of ETH at the exchange. The statement, uploaded last week, was revised on Thursday to reflect Coinbase’s commitment to creating a “level playing field” for all assets. Should an ETH PoW fork arise following The Merge, this asset will be reviewed with the same rigor as any other…

NFT-focused lending platform BendDAO is currently facing an insolvency crisis, having run out of funds to pay depositors. This comes shortly after predictions of mass NFT liquidations to reclaim the platform’s loans.  BendDAO is currently witnessing a bank run as several of the platform’s lenders withdrew their assets over the weekend. At writing the platform has roughly 425 wETH in its reserve and still owes its depositors about 13K ETH.  As analyst NFTStatistics.eth explained in a Twitter post, BendDAO’s debtors…

The Ethereum community – and market – have reached a fever pitch in anticipation of the long-awaited “Merge” update in September.  However, despite the tremendous excitement surrounding the event, there are critics who would hardly call it an “upgrade.” Among them is James Check – the lead on-chain analyst for Glassnode, a blockchain intelligence provider.  On August 7, the analyst unveiled a video presentation calling the protocol change a “monumental blunder”. He outlined how the merge will create systemic risks…

Ethereum developers have established tentative, official scheduling for the merge on September 15th. On that day, the network’s consensus mechanism will change from proof of work to proof of stake.  The date was established on Thursday during an Ethereum Foundation Consensus Layer Call. Developers agreed to target either September 15th or September 16th with the upgrade. However, the timing remains an estimate, and devs stressed that the official date is not finalized yet. On Thursday, developer Tim Beiko tweeted the…