ChainCatcher news, Vitalik published a long article on Warpcast titled "Possible futures of the Ethereum protocol, part 1: The Merge," in which he emphasized the exploration of "what improvements can be made to the technical design of proof of stake, and what are the pathways to achieve this goal?"Vitalik stated that the three goals of Ethereum staking are to maximize the number of validators that can participate in staking (which directly means minimizing the minimum ETH required for staking); to minimize the time for finality; and to minimize the overhead of running a node. Ideally, he hopes to maintain economic finality while improving the status quo in two areas: completing blocks within a time slot (ideally, maintaining or even reducing the current length of 12 seconds), rather than 15 minutes; and allowing validators to stake with 1 ETH (below the 32 ETH requirement).

ChainCatcher news, according to IntoTheBlock data, the current ETH staking rate is 28.9%, up from 23.8% in January, with over 15.3% staked for more than 3 years.

ChainCatcher message, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin posted on Farcaster that perhaps developers should realize that 32 ETH is a higher threshold for stakers than bandwidth requirements, and maybe they could slightly increase the bandwidth requirements in exchange for lowering the minimum staking deposit to, for example, 16 or 24 ETH. This would benefit both staking accessibility and scale. Then, once Ethereum is ready for the peerdas upgrade, the bandwidth requirements will decrease, and the minimum deposit limit could also be lowered to 1 ETH.

ChainCatcher news, Eigen Labs has launched the EigenPod upgrade, aimed at enhancing the convenience and yield of ETH staking. The EigenPod upgrade introduces a new balance checkpoint system for managing Ethereum validators and EigenPod balances. With this upgrade, the simplified checkpoint process allows any EigenPod owner (or designated proof submitter) to batch claim rewards, earn more rewards, and take advantage of improved user experience and tools.

ChainCatcher news, according to Cointelegraph, as previously disclosed by Bloomberg, the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission is considering providing Ethereum staking options for issuers of Ethereum spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which may allow these issuers to hold ETH and earn passive income.Insiders say that the Hong Kong SFC has received proposals in recent weeks and has been in discussions with relevant parties, but it is still in the discussion phase, and there is no specific timeline for implementation yet.

ChainCatcher news, according to The Data Nerd monitoring, 8 hours ago Amaranth Foundation founder James Fickel borrowed 350 WBTC (approximately 24.6 million USD) from Aave, and then exchanged it for 6,905 ETH. After that, he staked all the ETH to Lido.In the past 5 months, he has borrowed a total of 2,741 BTC (approximately 150 million USD), exchanging it for 51,200 ETH.

According to ChainCatcher news and the official announcement, Binance Wealth Management will launch SOL fixed-term products, BNB fixed-term products, and a limited-time ETH staking event. During the event, users who complete registration and subscribe to BNB, SOL fixed-term products and/or stake ETH can receive multiple rewards:Share airdrop rewards of 38,500 PORTAL;Enjoy a maximum annualized yield of 8.1% for subscribing to SOL fixed-term products;Enjoy BNB rewards with a maximum annualized yield of 1.39% for subscribing to BNB fixed-term products and earn new coin mining (Launchpool) and Megadrop rewards (if applicable);Stake ETH to earn approximately 3% dynamic annualized yield.Event duration: May 14, 08:00 to May 29, 07:59 (UTC+8).

According to ChainCatcher news and the official announcement, Binance Wealth Management will launch SOL fixed-term products, BNB fixed-term products, and a limited-time ETH staking event. During the event, participants who complete registration and subscribe to BNB, SOL fixed-term products and/or stake ETH can receive multiple rewards:Share airdrop rewards of 7,777 ACE;Enjoy up to 8.9% annualized yield for subscribing to SOL fixed-term products;Enjoy up to 1.69% annualized yield in BNB rewards for subscribing to BNB fixed-term products, ongoing Megadrop, and earn new token mining (Launchpool) rewards;Stake ETH to earn approximately 3% dynamic annualized yield.Event duration: From April 30, 2024, 08:00 to May 14, 2024, 07:59 (UTC+8).

According to ChainCatcher news and the official announcement, starting from March 14 at 20:30 (UTC+8), Binance will merge the existing fixed-term earning products and the dual currency investment VIP investor program into a unified project and upgrade the program. After the upgrade, the earning flexible products and ETH staking subscription amounts will be included in the statistics.This upgrade allows users holding multiple financial product assets to more easily obtain VIP levels 1-4 qualifications, unlocking more Binance VIP rewards. If users meet the 30-day average financial product subscription amount and BNB daily holding requirements specified in the table below, and are eligible for a VIP level higher than their current level, the account will be automatically upgraded to the corresponding VIP level during the period from 09:00 to 14:00 (UTC+8) the next day.

According to ChainCatcher news, the official announcement from OKX states that users who participated in ETH staking through OKX before the ETH merge will receive STRK airdrop tokens. OKX will complete the distribution of STRK tokens within 15 working days after the token distribution date of the Starknet Foundation (February 20 at 20:00).At that time, the airdrop tokens will be directly credited to the users' funding accounts, and no additional claim is required. After the airdrop is completed, users can check the received airdrop tokens in their funding accounts. OKX will announce the specific details of the airdrop separately.

ChainCatcher message, Binance Earn will support the distribution plan of Starknet (STRK) for Binance ETH staking users, where Binance ETH staking users will receive STRK tokens in their spot wallets based on the total amount of BETH in their eligible wallets as of the snapshot on September 16, 2022, at 7:59 (UTC+8).Eligible users will receive the STRK token distribution within 30 days after the official distribution date determined by the Starknet Foundation (February 20, 20:00).The final BETH:STRK distribution ratio, the list of eligible wallets, and the completion status of the STRK distribution plan will be announced separately by Binance.

ChainCatcher news, according to official information, ether.fi has now integrated with the OKX Web3 wallet, allowing users to stake and restake ETH on ether.fi through the OKX Web3 wallet and earn rewards.Ether.fi is a decentralized, non-custodial Ethereum staking protocol that allows stakers to maintain control over their private keys, ensuring the security and control of their funds. Additionally, Ether.fi has created a node service marketplace where stakers and node operators can register nodes to provide infrastructure services.It is reported that the OKX Web3 wallet is an industry-leading one-stop Web3 entry point, now supporting over 85 public chains, with a unified experience across app, plugin, and web, covering five major areas: wallet, DEX, DeFi, NFT marketplace, and DApp exploration, and supporting Ordinals marketplace, MPC and AA smart contract wallets, gas exchange, and hardware wallet connections.

ChainCatcher news, according to DefiLlama data, the total value locked (TVL) of the liquidity re-staking protocol EigenLayer has surpassed 7 billion dollars, currently at 7.011 billion dollars.

ChainCatcher news, the liquid staking platform ether.fi announced on social media that it will be open to all users, allowing the minting of eETH to earn ETH staking rewards, ether.fi points, and EigenLayer points.

ChainCatcher news, according to CoinDesk, Methodic Capital Management has launched the Methodic CoinDesk ETH Staking Fund, aimed at providing investors with total ETH returns by combining the risk exposure of the token itself with staking rewards.The fund utilizes the CoinDesk ETH Total Return Index (ETXTR), which is a combination of the CoinDesk ETH Price Index (ETX) and the Comprehensive ETH Staking Rate (CESR), calculated by CoinDesk Indices and managed by digital asset management firm CoinFund. BitGo will custody and stake the assets of the fund, while the investment bank and FINRA-registered market Oasis Pro Markets will act as a tokenization agent, incorporating the fund's shares into the blockchain world and facilitating secondary market trading.

ChainCatcher news, according to Lookonchain monitoring, two whales recently withdrew over $23 million worth of ETH from Binance for staking. One address withdrew 4,288 ETH, worth $7.2 million, 4 days ago, while the other address recently withdrew 9,530 ETH, worth $16 million.

ChainCatcher message, Frax Finance has initiated a proposal in the Arbitrum governance forum, seeking a grant of 1.5 million ARB to incentivize users of the Frax stablecoin and staked ETH tokens on Frax Finance on Arbitrum, thereby attracting more potential users to the Arbitrum ecosystem. The incentives will be distributed among sfrxETH, frxETH, FRAX, and FPI (Frax's unique anti-inflation stablecoin) and will utilize all funds within six months after the grant approval.Frax Finance also stated that if the application is approved, it will match a certain amount of funds for simultaneous incentives.

ChainCatcher news, Bitget Wallet launches ETH staking subsidy activity. Staking before 6 PM on September 10 is free of Gas fees, with an annualized yield of up to 10%, and rewards distributed in ETH. The total amount for this staking subsidy activity is 200 ETH, with a minimum staking threshold of 0.01 ETH for individual users (there is no minimum deposit limit for those not participating in the activity). Users can directly stake ETH or use any cryptocurrency in the wallet to easily exchange for stETH before participating.The ETH staking product launched by Bitget Wallet is simple and easy to use, optimizing every step of the staking process, lowering the participation threshold for users, and supporting real-time yield viewing and historical yield statistics, making it convenient for users to effectively manage their investments.

ChainCatcher news, the Ethereum Layer 2 network Mantle Network staked 40,000 ETH from the DAO treasury to Lido on August 21. Mantle stated that this is the first action authorized by the MIP-25 proposal, and the wstETH is currently held in the Mantle Treasury, awaiting the next steps. They hope to continue collaborating with Lido to introduce wstETH and other ETH staking applications into the Mantle ecosystem in the near future.ChainCatcher previously reported that the modular Ethereum Layer 2 network Mantle Network has passed a community proposal vote to stake up to 200,000 ETH from the Mantle Treasury.