Lido Finance hits 1M validators, fueling the growth of DeFi

April 29, 2024 Coin Telegraph

Macro factors to spark next crypto bull market in Q2 2024, Real Vision’s Raoul Pal says

October 5, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Macro factors will play a dominant role in sparking the next crypto bull market, which should start in Q2 2024, according to Raoul Pal.

The next crypto bull market is likely to kick off in Q2 2024, when the Bitcoin (BTC) halving is set to take place, says macro investor and Real Vision CEO Raoul Pal.

He is convinced that despite the hype surrounding the halving, macro factors will play the leading role in sparking the next uptrend.

According to Pal, the Bitcoin halving cycle coincides with the macro cycle, which means every halving so far has taken place in a similar macroeconomic environment: monetary expansion and low interest rates.

“Macro is actually the dominant factor, and the halving is a false narrative, but it doesn’t matter because it still works,” Pal said in an interview with Cointelegraph.

Among the main catalysts favoring crypto next year are central banks cutting interest rates and potential fiscal stimulus that could precede the United States presidential election.

Regarding price targets, Pal wants to avoid making predictions given that “you get beat over the head by people” for not getting them right.

Still, looking at past performance, Bitcoin could double or triple its latest all-time highs, Pal believes.

To learn more about how to prepare for the next crypto bull market, check out the full interview with Pal, and don’t forget to subscribe to Cointelegraph’s YouTube channel !

Vitalik Buterin on fix for Ethereum centralization — make running nodes easier

September 5, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin says node centralization is one of Ethereum’s main challenges, but the perfect solution may not come for another 20 years.

The centralization of nodes is one of the biggest problems facing the Ethereum network and should be addressed by making the running of nodes cheaper and easier, according to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.

Currently, the majority of the 5,901 active Ethereum nodes are being run through centralized web providers like Amazon Web Services, which many experts claim leaves the Ethereum blockchain exposed to a centralized point of failure.

*Distribution of Ethereum nodes from web service providers. Source: Ethernodes*

Speaking at Korea Blockchain Week, Buterin outlined six key problems that need addressing to solve centralization but highlighted that the node issue was a “big piece of the puzzle” to ensure the Ethereum network remains decentralized in the long run.

“One of those six things is making it technically easier for people to run nodes and statelessness is one of the really important technologies in doing that right,” he explained.

“Today, it takes hundreds of gigabytes of data to run a node. With stateless clients, you can run a node on basically zero.”

The concept of statelessness refers to removing the reliance on centralized service providers to verify activity on the network. According to the Ethereum Foundation, true decentralization is not possible until node operators can run Ethereum on modest and inexpensive hardware.

As Buterin noted, statelessness forms a key component of the Ethereum roadmap, with major steps towards statelessness being made in “The Verge” and “The Purge” stages:

“In the longer term there’s a plan to maintain fully verified Ethereum nodes where you could literally it on your phone.”

Updated roadmap diagram! pic.twitter.com/MT9BKgYcJH
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) November 4, 2022

Despite statelessness forming a core part of the Ethereum roadmap, Buterin admitted that these highly-technical concerns were unlikely to be addressed any time in the immediate future.

“These technical problems will have to be addressed eventually — maybe a 10-year timescale, maybe a 20-year timescale,” he said.

Outside of statelessness, Buterin said the next most significant moves toward decreasing Ethereum centralization included making documentation easier, lowering barriers to distributed staking, ensuring staking was more secure and more broadly, making it more convenient to stake Ether (ETH) in general.

Ultimately however, Buterin concluded that the most time-sensitive and pressing concern for Ethereum as whole was achieving higher levels of scalability.

At present, Ethereum scaling protocols dominate the use of zero-knowledge (ZK) rollups.

ZK-rollups have been lauded by many within the Ethereum community as a key tool to achieving scalability, as ZK-rollups work to improve throughput on the main Ethereum chain by moving computation and state storage off-chain.

Magazine: Here’s how Ethereum’s ZK-rollups can become interoperable

Ethereum validators may have to stake 64X more ETH, devs discuss

June 19, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

The proposal received mixed reactions from the crypto community, with some users stressing that it would make the network more centralized.

Ethereum core developers plan to implement a 64-fold increase in the minimum amount of staked Ether (ETH) required to become a validator, from 32 ETH to 2048 ETH.

The proposal was made during a June 15 Ethereum core developer consensus meeting by Ethereum Foundation researcher Michael Neuder. The researcher noted that although the current limit of 32 ETH allows more validators to join the Ethereum network, making it more decentralized, it also leads to an inflation of the validator set size.

Neuder added that such a large increase would ultimately help the Ethereum network become more efficient over time. Besides the proposal to increase the minimum required staked ETH for validators, Neuder also called for auto-compounding validator rewards.

Ethereum consensus layer meeting. Source: YouTube

The auto-compounding of rewards would allow validators to make more money on their staked ETH. Currently, to produce any staking income, rewards received in excess of the 32 ETH cap must be transferred to another account. These benefits could be rapidly compounded if the cap were raised, giving validators a practical way to increase their earn reward.

Neuder claimed the current proposal would not only make the Ethereum network more efficient and make way for validators to earn more money, but it would also help large node operators, such as exchanges, which currently manage thousands of validators.

The 32 ETH limit has led to a significant surge in validator addresses after Ethereum’s transition to a proof-of-stake network. Currently, there are over 700,000 validators with around 90,000 awaiting activation in the queue.

*Total Ethereum validators. Source: Beaconscan*

The proposal received mixed reactions from the crypto community with several users pointing out that such a significant change in staked ETH would lead to a lower number of validators and thus make the network more centralized. Other users dismissed the idea and claimed it wouldn't be beneficial for the network.

Magazine: Crypto regulation: Does SEC Chair Gary Gensler have the final say?

No ETH to trade? Ethereum exchange balance drops to a 5-year low

May 26, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

The ETH balance decline began in September 2022, dropping significantly in November and December after the downfall of FTX.

The balance of available Ether (ETH) across crypto exchanges dropped to a five-year low on May 26, bringing the total amount of Ether held on exchanges to 17.86 million. A drastic decline in the exchange supply of ETH like this has not been seen since April 2018.

According to Glassnode data, only 14.85% of the total Ether supply is currently held on centralized exchanges, compared with the 25–26% of supply held during the 2021 bull run.

*The decline in Ether exchange balances. Source: Glassnode*

The drop in ETH supply began in September 2022, dropping significantly after the FTX crisis in November. Apart from a decline in the exchange balance, Ethereum wallet addresses holding more than 100 ETH have also declined to a six-month low.

#Ethereum $ETH Number of Addresses Holding 100+ Coins just reached a 6-month low of 46,858

View metric:https://t.co/FbjiMG3uFX pic.twitter.com/uzHN7H2qRy
— glassnode alerts (@glassnodealerts) May 18, 2023

Two significant events could have influenced the decline in ETH balances on centralized exchanges in the recent past. The first is the collapse of the FTX crypto exchange, prompting many to move their crypto assets from exchange wallets to self-custody wallets; the second, and most important, is the Shapella upgrade.

Shapella made way for thousands of validators to withdraw their staked ETH. However, contrary to popular belief, a minority of validators decided to unstake, while the majority only withdrew their staking rewards.

The movement of assets away from exchanges is considered a bullish sign, indicating traders are not looking to sell at the current price. In Ethereum’s case, re-staking ETH is the most apparent reason for the declining exchange supply.

Major crypto exchanges like Binance, Bitfinex, Kraken and others that supported the Shapella upgrade saw a significant outflow of ETH from their exchange wallets, leading to the current balance decline.

*ETH withdrawal from crypto exchanges. Source: Nansen*

As Cointelegraph reported earlier, in the week after the Shapella upgrade, the amount of ETH being staked surpassed the amount of ETH being withdrawn. Another report from Glassnode estimated that less than 1% of staked ETH was expected to be sold. Thus, a significant chunk of ETH moving away from centralized exchanges returned to staking.

Magazine: 2023 is a make-or-break year for blockchain gaming: Play-to-own

3 reasons why Lido DAO price jumped 40% in a week — Outperforming Bitcoin, Ethereum

May 16, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Bitcoin Price

LDO price is well-positioned to gain another 50% by June based on a classic bullish reversal setup after Lido DAO rebounds 40%.

The price of Lido DAO (LDO) has rebounded to its three-week high of $2.21 as of May 16, up 40% when measured from its local low of $1.57, established four days ago.

This impressive double-digit recovery appeared in tandem with other top-ranking crypto assets, including Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH). However, LDO has greatly outperformed the broader crypto market (TOTAL) that's up only 4.5% since May 12.

*LDO/USD daily price returns vs. BTC/USD, ETH/USD, and TOTAL. Source: TradingView*

But what are the reasons why Lido DAO is outperforming the rest of the cryptocurrency market right now? Let's take a closer look at the three biggest factors likely driving up LDO price.

Ethereum depositors' return after Shapella

The LDO price recovery coincides with the net positive inflows into Ethereum's proof-of-stake (PoS) contract in recent days.

Lido DAO is primarily an Ethereum liquid staking platform. It enables users to pool their funds to become validators on Ethereum, thus bypassing the network's requirement of depositing at least 32 ETH.

In April, Ethereum underwent a network upgrade called Shapella, which supports reward withdrawals from its staking contract. As a result, its PoS contract witnessed days when the amount of ETH withdrawals outnumbered deposits.

For instance, the net ETH staked with its PoS contract were 19.27 million ETH on April 11, a day before the Shapella upgrade. The number fell to 90,704 a week later, followed by a consistent recovery, according to data tracked by Nansen.

*Ethereum deposits and withdrawals into/from its PoS contract. Source: Nansen*

As of May 16, the Ethereum PoS contract had over 20 million ETH, underscoring the growing demand for liquid staking service providers like Lido DAO. The price of its governance token LDO likely benefited from the narrative.

For instance, Lido DAO's nearest competitor, RocketPool (RPL), has also soared 15% to around $50 when measured from its May 12 low.

Lido V2 mainnet launch

It should be noted that Lido DAO did not support full ETH withdrawals. Instead, it issued staked Ethereum (stETH), theoretically pegged to ETH by 1:1, to users that could be exchanged freely for other crypto assets across exchanges.

But that was until recently.

On May 15, Lido DAO launched the mainnet version of "Lido V2," which enables Ethereum stakers to burn their stETH and exit the protocol at a 1:1 ratio. Since the upgrade, LDO price has climbed 20%, or half of its 40% rebound thus far.

Lido DAO whales have also supported LDO's upside move in the days leading up to the Lido V2 launch. And, according to data resource Lookonchain. This may suggest that the "buy the rumor" scenario may have contributed to the LDO price rally.

Due to the launch of Lido V2, we noticed 3 whales accumulating $LDO in the past week.

- 0x9EA7 withdrew 724,822 $LDO($1.52M) from #Binance at $2.01.

- 0x4E4e withdrew 655,641 $LDO($1.38M) from #Binance at $1.83.

- 0x9eda bought 570,883 $LDO with 974K $USDC at $1.71 on May 12. pic.twitter.com/S0cNUxpLw0
— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) May 16, 2023

LDO price rising wedge bounce

From a technical standpoint, LDO's 40% bounce started near the lower trendline of a prevailing falling wedge setup. Traditional analysts see a falling wedge as a bullish reversal pattern.

*Lido DAO daily price chart. Source: TradingView*

The LDO/USD pair has recovered similarly in recent history, with each rebound taking its price to the wedge's upper trendline. Now with the price treading around the upper trendline again, LDO could enter a breakout stage or pull back to retest the lower trendline.

LDO's breakout scenario will have the price rally toward $3.35 by June 2023, up around 50% from current price levels. This target appears after adding the maximum wedge height to the potential breakout point near $2.70.

Conversely, the pullback scenario could bring the LDO price near $1.56 by June 2023, down 30% from current price levels. This level has served as support and resistance in the past.

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.

SafeMoon hacker agrees to return 80% of stolen funds: Finance Redefined

April 22, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

SafeMoon hacker said the exploit wasn't intentional plans to return majority of the exploited funds.

Welcome to Finance Redefined, your weekly dose of essential decentralized finance (DeFi) insights — a newsletter crafted to bring you the most significant developments from the past week.

This week in DeFi saw the hacker behind the $8.9 million SafeMoon exploit agree to return the majority of the stolen funds. According to the project’s developers, the hacker will return 80% while keeping the remaining 20%.

United States crypto lender BlockFi was granted an additional 48-day extension to submit its exit plan by a New Jersey bankruptcy judge, exploring the potential sale of company assets and restructuring.

Ether (ETH) price hit a new 11-month high even as post-Shapella withdrawals peaked at over 1 million ETH. Meanwhile, Ethereum gas fees touched new multimonth highs owing to a fresh memecoin frenzy. The heavy traffic on the network allowed a maximal extractable value (MEV) bot to make millions in sandwich exploits.

The top 100 DeFi tokens broke out of a two-week bullish streak that began in anticipation of Ethereum’s Shapella upgrade, with most of said tokens trading in the red on the weekly charts.

SafeMoon hacker agrees to return 80% of stolen funds, says the development team

The attacker who drained $8.9 million worth of BNB (BNB) from SafeMoon has agreed to return 80% of the funds, according to an April 18 blockchain message from the SafeMoon team.

The encoded message was the latest in a series of communications between the SafeMoon team and the attacker as the parties attempted to settle.

Continue reading

Crypto lender BlockFi is granted extra time to file Chapter 11 exit plan

BlockFi, a lender of digital assets, was given additional time to submit a bankruptcy exit plan by a New Jersey bankruptcy judge in the United States on April 19.

The cryptocurrency lender filed for bankruptcy in November 2022 and has been reportedly granted a 48-day extension until May 15 to file an exit plan. The crypto firm is exploring a potential sale of company assets or the possibility of getting an outside backer to support a restructuring deal, BlockFi lawyer Joshua Sussberg said in a hearing on April 19.

Continue reading

Ether hits 11-month high as post-Shapella withdrawals pass 1 million ETH

Over 1 million ETH, worth $2.1 billion, was withdrawn from Ethereum’s Beacon Chain within the first four days of the Shapella hard fork, with Ether reaching over $2,100 for the first time in 11 months.

The 1.03 million ETH withdrawn came from 473,700 withdrawal requests, with April 15 representing the largest withdrawal day at 392,800 ETH, according to data from the Beacon Chain.

Continue reading

Subway-themed trading bot makes millions using “sandwich” attacks

An anonymous MEV bot operator cashed in well over $1 million this week by executing “sandwich attacks” against buyers and sellers of two new memecoins.

The wallet address, linked to the Ethereum Name Service domain “jaredfromsubway.eth,” made $950,000 from the sandwich attacks on April 18 and profited about $300,000 and $400,000 on April 17 and 19, respectively, according to an April 19 tweet from nonfungible token data platform Sealaunch.

Continue reading

DeFi market overview

DeFi’s total market value plunged by $4 billion this past week. Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that DeFi’s top 100 tokens by market capitalization had a bearish week, with most trading in the red. The total value locked in DeFi protocols fell below $50 billion.

Thanks for reading our summary of this week’s most impactful DeFi developments. Join us next Friday for more stories, insights and education regarding this dynamically advancing space.

Ethereum gas fee jumped due to memecoin frenzy with mixed comments on network usability

April 20, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Ethereum proponents celebrated the growth in daily revenue, while many others pointed toward network congestion and difficulty in usage.

Ethereum network’s gas fee skyrocketed to a new multi-month high amid a growing memecoin frenzy. The high transaction fee has swelled Ethereum’s daily revenue multifold compared to Bitcoin (BTC). While Ethereum proponents celebrated the growth in revenue, many others were quick to point out the growing congestion on the network and the difficulty in processing transactions.

There was an unusual shift in the top 10 gas-burning altcoins where instead of ETH (ETH), WETH, and USDT (USDT), memecoins such as TROLL, APEDand BOBO were among the top 10 spenders.

⛽️ A highly unusual shift in top 10 gas burning #altcoins has emerged today. Instead of $ETH, $WETH, and $USDT being at the top of the fee distribution list, we're seeing new assets like $TROLL, $APED, and $BOBO among them. Read our latest deep dive. https://t.co/7SlmJ59k2m pic.twitter.com/Y2kaLKZTrL
— Santiment (@santimentfeed) April 19, 2023

The average gas price for Ethereum transactions as of April 20 was 81.94 gwei, up from 60.82 gwei on April 19 and 44.42 gwei last year — an increase of 34.74% from April 19 and 84.46% from April 20, 2022. Gwei is a denomination of the Ether and represents one billionth of one ETH.

*ETH gas fee increase in last month. Source: Ychart*

Independent Ethereum educator Anthony Sassano shared the surge in daily fee revenue of the Ethereum network and said that the second-largest blockchain had brought in 28 times the revenue of Bitcoin. He also cited Ethereum layer-2 platforms like Arbitrum One that have outperformed the BTC network in terms of daily revenue due to the ongoing meme frenzy.

*Daily and weekly revenue of various blockchain. Source: Twitter*

Ethereum proponent’s main argument is that the high gas fee and subsequent higher revenue highlight the network’s growing usability. However, many on Crypto Twitter were quick to point out that the extensive usage they are referring to is just a few thousand users gambling on memecoins.

The extensive usage you’re talking about are a few thousand users gambling meme coins. I thought (and hoped) eth was supposed to be the future of finance
— nap.BasicallyRiskFree (@CryptoPannella) April 20, 2023

A few users reportedly paid gas fees as high as a few hundred dollars, while others complained about having to pay a higher gas fee than the actual transaction.

try to buy a ~$20 NFT on eth, and the gas is ~$40.
some ppl say the infra operators deserve to be paid. sure, but imaging paying visa $40 fee for buying a $20 digital good.. infra should be affordable. pic.twitter.com/5L4SYjT5af
— 0xMQQ (@0xMQQ) April 18, 2023

Another prominent reason for the soaring gas fees was blamed on a Maximal Extractable Value (MEV) trading bot that is front-running memecoin trades on a massive scale. The bot in question jaredfromsubway.eth has been the top gas spender in the last 24 hours, spending 455 ETH ($950,000) and using 7% of the total gas of the network.

In the last two months, it spent more than 3,720 ETH ($7 million) in gas fees and performed more than 180,000 transactions.

bro has used 7% of the total gas on ethereum over the past 24hrs (455 ETH) just feasting away on $pepe

data from the legendary @hildobby_ https://t.co/j3SqtQnkKJ pic.twitter.com/hWavtdO1D5
— beetle (@1kbeetlejuice) April 18, 2023

The Subway-themed bot is using the sandwich trading technique to pocket millions of dollars while congesting the network at the same time.

Magazine: ‘Account abstraction’ supercharges Ethereum wallets: Dummies guide

Coinbase’s Base network gets OpenZeppelin security integration

April 19, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Contract upgrades, admin changes and protocol tweaks can now be made using standard APIs that were previously unavailable on Base.

The OpenZeppelin Defender smart contract security platform has now integrated with Coinbase’s Base network, allowing Web3 app developers on Base to automate security tasks.

According to an April 19 announcement from blockchain cybersecurity firm OpenZeppelin, app developers on Base can now use the Defender software to create multi-signature admin contracts and timelocks, employ Relayers to store keys and sign transactions along with creating automated “sentinels” to monitor the blockchain and react when events occur.

These tools can be used for routine but sensitive admin tasks such as upgrading contracts, tweaking numerical parameters, or pausing a contract should an emergency occur according to the program’s documentation.

The Defender app was available on Ethereum and most other networks in the past, but as it was not integrated with Base, developers could not use it on the new testnet until now.

OpenZeppelin's CTO Jonathan Alexander stated in the announcement that the integration will make smart contracts "more secure and expansive” while Base lead Jesse Pollak signaled excitement at the team-up saying that “security is key for a thriving onchain ecosystem."

Coinbase announced the launch of the Base test network on Feb. 23. It plans to produce a mainnet version as a layer-2 of Ethereum once testing is complete.

Some Ethereum users have speculated that Coinbase wants to help onboard institutional investors to Web3 through the new network as it will feature Masa Finance identity verification tools.

OpenZeppelin is most known for its library of open-source smart contracts which are often modified by developers and used for their own purposes throughout the Ethereum ecosystem.

Binance users get new ETH deposit addresses: Here’s what to do

April 18, 2023 Coin Telegraph

Binance

Binance said retiring old deposit addresses on multiple blockchains is part of its infrastructure upgrade, with the new addresses offering better security and efficiency.

The world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, Binance, is disabling multiple old deposit addresses as part of its infrastructure upgrade.

In an announcement on April 18, Binance said it would retire selected deposit addresses and memos in batches on multiple blockchains, including Ether (ETH), Tron (TRX), BNB (BNB) and Stellar (XLM). The crypto exchange said that the retirement of old addresses is a routine and a part of enhancing security and efficiency for the users.

*List of retired deposit addresses on various blockchain networks. Source: Binance*

The users of these impacted deposit blockchain addresses will be notified via email, and the exchange strongly encouraged that all impacted users obtain a new address and memo upon receiving the notification. The notification email will include the expiration date for any outdated deposit addresses. When users get a new address, old deposit addresses will become invalid.

To obtain a new deposit address, users must log in to their Binance account and follow the instructions mentioned in their email notification. The migration is scheduled for between April and June 2023.

The crypto exchange also assured that the funds wouldn’t be lost if someone mistakenly sent assets to expired addresses. However, payments made to addresses that have already expired will not be immediately reimbursed. Users must manually credit the deposits from the old address using the “transaction history” page.

Binance regularly upgrades and maintains its infrastructure from time to time. The exchange recently raised the alarm against 191 high-risk, untrustworthy decentralized applications and fake tokens on its native blockchain network called BNB Chain.

The change in deposit addresses of multiple blockchains, including that of Ethereum, comes just a day before Binance is set to open ETH withdrawal for users. Millions of Ether are now unlocked after the Shapella upgrades on April 12, with major exchanges and custodians having already made arrangements for users to unstake their ETH from the Beacon Chain nearly three years after staking it.

Magazine: Crypto audits and bug bounties are broken: Here’s how to fix them

Ethereum 2.0