A new fork for Ethereum after The Merge. The Ethereum network will soon have a massive upgrade with The Merge. While this merger is getting a lot of praise from the majority of the Ethereum community, it is not welcome for everyone.
Indeed, several players in the cryptocurrency industry have already criticized the project which they believe could negatively affect the currency in the long term. Among the criticisms, the most virulent come from the miners whose role is entirely replaced with the implementation of the new update.
It is therefore not surprising that the latter has formed a coalition with a group of equally dissatisfied anonymous developers to launch an Ethereum fork. The latter will be implemented after the merger due to occur next week.
The creation of a fork based on Ethereum
The Ethereum upgrade will mainly serve to change the mechanism of the blockchain from the Proof of Work method to the Proof of Stake (PoS) method. This is one of the most controversial topics within the Ethereum community.
According to the latest news, a group of anonymous developers, together with many prominent Ethereum miners, intend to perform a hard fork of the Ethereum blockchain after next week's The Merge. This separation will allow them to get a version of the network that works with the Proof of Work (PoW) consensus mechanism.
Since this fork (ETHPoW) comes directly from the main Ethereum network, it will share the same transaction history. However, once the update is done, it will start creating its own blocks and working independently. In addition, all token balances and smart contracts specific to the main Ethereum network will also be transferred after the separation.
This, therefore, means that all ETH holders on the main blockchain will have an equal balance of ETHW on the new ETHPoW chain. It is however very important that you note that the ETHW will only come from the fork of the blockchain. Once separated, ETHW will represent an entirely different asset than the original ETH that is present on Ethereum.
What is the interest of a fork of Ethereum?
The fork announcement didn't really create a stir within the industry. For the vast majority of Ethereum network users, the planned PoW fork is of little interest as an investment.
Indeed, almost all relevant DeFi, NFT, and network infrastructure protocols have publicly announced their support for the new PoS chain. A situation that clearly leaves the PoW fork in a rather difficult situation.
It is quite possible that as soon as the fork is implemented, all decentralized exchanges will stop working. Centralized stablecoins like USDC and USDT will certainly no longer have any value and will lead to massive liquidations that will break many DeFi protocols. However, the fork is not only a source of inconvenience, since it still brings certain advantages to its users.
The ETHW token: a cryptocurrency with several advantages
While it is true that the PoW fork will have to start from scratch once independent, the ETHW which is one of the tokens linked to its creation, will likely retain some value. Indeed, it is very likely that the PoW fork will find a few loyal supporters who will continue to develop it. The work produced by them will thus create a demand for its token.
This is a situation that has already occurred in 2016 with the DAO hard fork that gave birth to Ethereum Classic. Thus, even those who do not believe in the future of the fork would still be tempted to sell their ETHW tokens after the merger to pocket some additional gains.
If you want to benefit from these tokens after the PoW fork, you just need to deposit some ETH on a centralized exchange that has announced that it will support the fork. Among the platforms that have officially issued statements, you have Poloniex, Binance, MEXC Global, Gate.io, FTX, OKX, and BitMEX. Coinbase and Kraken have also said they will consider an ETH PoW fork as they would any other asset. They, therefore, intend to list it on their platform if necessary.
According to reviews, Poloniex, Binance, MEXC Global, Gate.io and FTX are the platforms where you will most likely receive your ETHW equivalents after The Merge. Favor Binance, because as the first centralized exchange in terms of trading volume, it is certainly the one that will have the largest market.
The risks caused by the Ethereum fork
Before getting involved in the process related to forking Ethereum, it is essential that you first understand the risks associated with it. One of the dangers frequently mentioned by experts is the risk of relaying transactions. For the latter, if an Ethereum fork is launched with the same chain ID as the main PoS chain, it is quite possible that all transactions will be relayed.
This simply means that each transaction signed on a forked chain could be validated on the main Ethereum PoS chain. This situation will give rise to the appearance of new scams that can empty users' wallets.
However, the PoW fork is unlikely to use the same chain ID as the main chain. This will not prevent unscrupulous individuals from trying to launch other forks whose sole objective will be to steal users' ETH PoS.
So be sure to exercise caution before signing your trades on an ETH fork. If you have doubts about the nature of the network or you are not familiar with the technology, it is better that you do nothing.
The Merge is fast approaching and also influences other cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum Classic (ETC), another fork that is on the rise following the changes to come for the Ethereum blockchain.
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