One of the most awaited Ethereum updates, The Merge, was supposed to have zero downtime. But community members decided to take extra precautionary measures to safeguard investor funds. In this attempt, cryptocurrency exchange FTX declared that it would freeze trading for Ethereum (ETH) on different blockchains until the September update finishes. With the Merge update, the Ethereum blockchain will gradually switch from a Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus method to a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism, which facilitates sharding and consumes less energy. Terminal Total Difficulty (TTD) The Terminal Total Difficulty (TTD), which enables the transition based on the total mining power that goes into generating a chain, is what Ethereum developers claim will allow the Merge to switch to PoS with no downtime. Despite the justification, FTX decided to halt deposits and withdrawals until the Merge concludes. “As the ETH merge approaches, FTX will temporarily disable blockchain transfers of secondary chains for ETH to make sure that settlement is clean; the main chain ETH will stay active for longer.” Ethereum Foundation Will Not Lower Gas Prices The Ethereum Foundation stated that the next update will not lower gas prices, confirming one of the biggest myths surrounding The Merge. The official announcement reads, “Gas fees are a product of network demand relative to the network’s capacity. The Merge deprecates the use of Proof-of-Wo...
