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The threshold of 524,288 Ether on the Ethereum 2.0 deposit agreement was finally reached a few hours before the deadline. The Proof-of-Stake can now start on December 1st.
Things seemed to be going badly. Less than a day before the deadline, more than 200,000 ETH on the Ethereum 2.0 deposit contract were still missing. This threshold was essential to respect the initial schedule.
It is now a reality. 524,288 ETH (even more) are available on this contract, thus allowing to generate the Genesis block of Ethereum 2.0. The deployment of phase 0 of ETH 2.0 will be able to start on December 1st.
However, Ethereum owners were not in a hurry to block (staking) their cryptocurrency. It is true that the jump in value of Ethereum did not encourage the holders to stake their currency for more than two years. Indeed, the price now exceeds $600 and the temptation to sell might have held certain persons back.
But during the last days of the countdown, the deposits jumped. More than 200,000 ETH arrived on the Ethereum 2.0 deposit contract within only 14 hours.
It should be remembered that validators paying at least 32 ETH will not be able to recover their deposit before Ethereum phase 1.5. Therefore, they will have to wait up to 2 years. The required staking participation therefore presents a risk.
The implementation of the ambition of ETH 2.0 can now begin. However, December 1 will not be the actual launch of the blockchain for the new Ethereum. Phase 0 will activate a parallel blockchain or “beacon chain”.
The latter will operate in parallel with the current Ethereum network. Consequently, the expected benefits in terms of processing capacity are not for now. The initial phases will have no impact on the users and the decentralized applications of Ethereum.
The 16.384 validators of the blockchain will validate blocks and transactions, filling the role of minors on the proof-of-stake network. In return, they will receive rewards in the form of ETH.
The activation of the beacon chain on December 1st represents the first of the 4 phases of the migration to Ethereum 2.0. And it is only in time that applications and users will switch to the new blockchain.