Ethereum developers have made the next big announcement as regards the Dencun upgrade. Tim Beiko, an Ethereum core developer, shared this on X.
According to Beiko, more testnet blobs are on their way, as Dencun will activate on the Sepolia testnet on Jan. 30 and the Holesky testnet on Feb. 7. He urges node operators on either network to update. Beiko further adds that, assuming both of these go smoothly, Ethereum Dencun will be scheduled on the Ethereum mainnet next.
Goerli blobs were recently launched as Dencun went live on the Goerli testnet at 6:32 a.m. UTC on Jan. 17, 2024. The Sepolia and Holesky testnets will upgrade subsequently over the next two weeks. Dencun will activate on Sepolia at epoch 132608 on Jan. 30 at 10:51 p.m. UTC and on Holesky at epoch 29696 on Feb. 7 at 11:35 a.m. UTC.
The eagerly anticipated Dencun update follows last year's Shapella upgrade and includes changes to both Ethereum's consensus and execution layers.
Tomiwabold OlajideThe upgrade features several changes, the most notable of which is the implementation of ephemeral data blobs with EIP-4844, often known as "protodanksharding," which will help cut L2 transaction fees.
Ethereum momentum to pick up in weeks
Michael Van de Poppe, a crypto analyst, predicts that momentum for ETH might likely emerge in the coming weeks. He presents three arguments: Bitcoin's bottoming out could be a catalyst for altcoins to resume their upward trend. The second reason is the buzz around the Ethereum Spot ETF. Third, Ethereum plans to implement new upgrades that are anticipated to lower transaction fees by 90%.
According to Glassnode, BTC perpetual swaps accounted for 55% of open interest in January 2022 and have subsequently increased to 66.2%. ETH's open interest dominance, however, fell from 45% to 33.8% between 2022 and 2024.
But following the ETF approval, ETH regained some market share, with its dominance increasing to more than 40% by this metric.
Dan Burgin
U.Today Editorial Team
Vladislav Sopov