In the Ethereum 2.0 smart contract, which makes its depositors validators of the network, 6,805,325 5 ethers (ETH) are deposited, amounting to more than USD 21 billion -- more than the reserves of at least 120 countries.

Nearly 206 thousand addresses have deposited 6.8 million ETH, and each had to "lock" a total of 32 ethers in the smart contract.

According to the data provided by the World Bank, many Latin American countries are included among these nations. El Salvador, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Honduras, Paraguay, Venezuela, the Dominican Republic, Uruguay, and Guatemala all have reserves that range between USD 3 billion (El Salvador ) and USD 18 billion ( Guatemala )

APR is currently 6% and this figure is expected to decline as new validators add their ETH. 

While there's many higher interest yielding crypto products, most people staking ETH believe the token itself will soon explode in value, and view this as gaining an extra 6% while HODLing. 

Ethereum is up over 18% in just the last week.

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Author: Fernando Perez
Latin America Newsdesk

Ethereum developers have informed us that the test run, which has been running on the Ropsten testnet for the last 3 weeks, is officially being called 'a success'.

Known as the 'London' update - this is considered by many as the most important update to Ethereum since it's creation.

Important For One HUGE Reason - This Should Solve The Problem Of High Fees...

'London' is actually a package of five different updates (AKA EIPs - Ethereum Improvement Proposals) among them is EIP 1559 which  changes the way commissions are paid on the network, where each transaction will pay a base commission (a part of this fee will be burned) and the tip figure for miners is established.

Miners aren't so excited, they claim that their income could be reduced - but their crying is music to the ears of any user who has been paying absurd fees for months.  The miners had a run of inflated fees they should never have expected, and while I'm sure it was a great time to be an ETH miner, it obviously was something that wouldn't and couldn't last forever. 

Better Late Than Never...

This has taken way too long. I say this as someone who could easily do 20 transactions on the Ethereum blockchain on a normal week, between trading and dApps - so I'm not some 'hater' spreading FUD, or shilling for some competing blockchain. 

I've shared my frustrations on how long this was taking in a previous report, and it was doing research for that report when I realized the reason I felt like I had been waiting for so long, is that I actually was.

I looked back to when rising fees first became a concern, and found posts made in 2018 where Ethereum developers were discussing the problem of high fees - which at the time was $0.74 cents, a price we'd celebrate today. 

But back then, that $0.74 cents was worthy of an urgent response "As the number of transactions on Ethereum keeps going up and up, we have no time to lose" said one developer.  

If there was 'no time to lose' in 2018, there's no way around it - you're pathetically slow if you don't deliver until 2021. 

So - When Is It Happening?

The London update will go live along with block 12,965,000 being processed - we're on block 12,833,326 right now. 

Assuming Ethereum transactions maintain their current average - we're looking at Thursday Aug 5th, around 2:00am Los Angeles time.  But it's probably best to just think anytime between Aug 2nd and Aug 7th.


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Author: Ross Davis 
E-Mail: Ross@GlobalCryptoPress.com Twitter:@RossFM
San Francisco Newsroom / Breaking Crypto News