ETH in Crisis?! L2s Stealing All the Sparkle ✨

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Right, so Ethereum, still the Big Cheese 🧀 when it comes to stablecoins and, like, tokenized *everything*. We’re talking a gazillion dollars in stablecoins ($130 billion, apparently, but who’s counting? Not me, obvs). And tokenized treasuries! BUIDL thingy has, like, a *billion* something dollars. Loads of dosh floating around, you’d think everyone would be thrilled.

Except, plot twist! Ether’s performance? Pants. Utterly. Apparently, the ETH/BTC ratio (whatever *that* is) is at a five-year low. Five years! It’s practically ancient history in crypto years. Feel a bit sorry for it, actually. Like Bridget Jones at a singles party. Alone. With too much Chardonnay. 🍷

Apparently, Coin Metrics (whoever *they* are – sound important though 🤔) say this whole “Ethereum is rich but feeling poor” situation is down to Layer 2s and ETH not getting any love from network fees. Rude!

Ethereum’s Value Leak – Panic! 😱

So, they introduced “blobspace” (sounds like something out of a bad sci-fi movie 👽) with this EIP-4844 thing in the Dencun upgrade (honestly, who comes up with these names?!). Apparently, it was meant to be a good thing, but now Ethereum is making next to nothing in fees. Like, $30 million one year, and then BAM! $500,000 the next. Ouch. That’s gotta hurt.

Coin Metrics (again, those guys) say it’s because everyone’s gone to Layer 2s, and Ethereum’s left holding the bag. Base, Arbitrum, and Optimism (seriously, these names!) are raking it in. Apparently they are scoffing all the profits while Ethereum pays for security. Not fair!

And blob fees are, like, a tiny percentage of total fees. So, less ETH gets burned (whatever *that* means – something to do with making it more valuable, I think), which is also bad. Basically, everything is going wrong. *Sigh*.

Ethereum is burning, like, 70 ETH per day. Which sounds like a lot, but apparently it’s not enough. It means there’s more ETH being made than burned, which makes the price go down. Sad face. 😞 But they’re hoping these Layer 2 things will eventually save the day. Eventually. So, sometime next Tuesday, then? Maybe? 🙏

What’s Next? More Blobs? 🤔

Apparently, blobspace is going to become cheaper (good!). And Layer 2s are going to get even richer (not so good for Ethereum, maybe?). And there will be loads more Layer 2s and blob transactions (whatever *they* are!). Ethereum is posting, like, 21,000 blobs a day (still sounds a bit sci-fi to me). Good for them, I suppose.

With the Pectra upgrade (still laughing at the name) and Fusaka (even funnier) after that, Ethereum wants to make blob capacity bigger. Because apparently, bigger is better? It would make transactions cheaper and encourage more Layer 2 activity. Which is supposed to be a good thing. Eventually. They also want to focus on stablecoins, tokenization, and DeFi (whatever *that* is!). Basically, try to make more money. Fingers crossed! 🤞

And after Pectra, they’re going to look at staking Ether ETFs (or something like that). Honestly, it’s all a bit confusing. But maybe it will make things better? One can only hope. Now, where’s that Chardonnay…? 🥂

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2025-04-02 13:49