weekly #22 | Ethereal news

200M+ gas limit target post-Glamsterdam, 25M blocks on mainnet, Arbitrum DAO voted to release frozen ETH

Soldøgn interop recap, core protocol contributors met in Svalbard for a week focused on Glamsterdam upgrade:
- 200M+ gas limit target post-Glamsterdam upgrade
- ePBS implementations running with external builders
- EIP8037 state creation gas cost increase: changed from being dynamic to a fixed cost per state byte
- Tim Beiko finished work on L1 R&D
- Alex Stokes on 3 month sabbatical, Pari covering ACDC moderation
25M blocks on mainnet
Ethereum Foundation:
- Ethereum Protocol Fellowship cohort 7 intro town hall (video), apply by May 13
- EF sold 10k ETH to Bitmine for average price of $2,292.15
ETHGlobal Open Agents finalists from 468 hackathon projects
Thomas Jay Rush: you say you want a revolution (book), collection of 75 essays
ETH metrics:
- Gas (gwei): 0.5 average, 0.1 - 22 (12.9 for zero net issuance)
- ETH supply change: 19k net issuance
- ETHUSD: $2,274 - $2,411 (all time high $4,946, August 24, 2025)
- ETH ETFs: 5.2% of ETH supply
- ETHBTC: 0.029 (0.166 for the Flippening)

Consensys

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Morgan Stanley E*Trade ETH trading rolling out
Bitwise Asset Management to manage USCC (formerly Superstate’s crypto carry fund)

DeFi United (effort to restore rsETH backing):
- Arbitrum DAO voted to release frozen ETH
- Aave LLC filed to vacate restraining notice that attempts to seize frozen ETH
- Aave: attacker rsETH positions liquidated on mainnet & Arbitrum
Alchemix v3 caps raised
Slow: reversible payments (during time delay) for ETH/ERC20, live on mainnet
BasePaint (daily shared NFT canvas): 1000 days of painting

Solidity (language): pattern matching over algebraic data types planned for Core Solidity
Fe (language) Bountiful (bug bounty platform): 0.25 ETH claimable per challenge for finding a bug in the compiler, challenge contract or registry
Growthepie (dashboard): total value secured by language in top 1000 contracts
Sourcify (verification) migrate to v2 before July 7, legacy v1 API brownouts
ApeShift (tool): migrate projects from Brownie to Ape
Tama (dev framework): Verity contracts consist of formal specification, implementation & proof (implementation matches specification)
Leo Alt evm-smith: Claude written assembly & Lean proofs, minimal wrapped-ETH clone
Optimism actions (TypeScript SDK): modules to integrate DeFi into applications, adds lend, swap & wallet support
Application layer standards (ERCs):
- ERC8248: Keyed transfer with authorization
- ERC8249: Generic relayer architecture for smart accounts
- ERC8251: Agent compliance
- ERC8255: Expiring token approvals
- ERC8257: Agent tool registry
- ERC8258: Token safety score
- ERC8259: AI agent identity & threat registry

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore payments preview, uses Coinbase or Stripe Privy wallets and x402
PSE: anonymous credentials for trustless agents, proposal for composable privacy layer above ERC8004

Glamsterdam upgrade (targeting mid-2026):
- bal-devnet-7 targeting next week, last planned execution layer devnet
- glamsterdam-devnet-3 launched
- Proposed for inclusion:
  - EIP8252 execution layer reorg state retention window
  - EIP8254 cap deposit requests per block
- Considered for inclusion:
  - EIP8246 remove SELFDESTRUCT burn; usage analysis
Hegotá upgrade (targeting late-2026):
- Non-headliners proposed for inclusion:
  - EIP7709 read BLOCKHASH from storage & update cost; presentation
  - EIP8253 remove pre-Spurious-Dragon accounts

Ethspectoor: spec data explorer (consensus, execution, builder, relay, beacon APIs, execution APIs & remote signing); static explorer & MCP
Ethereum improvement proposals (EIPs):
- EIP8246: Remove SELFDESTRUCT burn
- EIP8247: Ancestor-indexed BALs
- EIP8250: Keyed nonces for Frame transactions (Vitalik explainer)
- EIP8252: Execution-layer reorg state retention window
- EIP8253: Remove pre-Spurious-Dragon accounts
- EIP8254: Cap deposit requests per block
- EIP8256: Blob streaming

ethStaker deposit CLI v1.3.0: adds easier mnemonic creation, improved keystore validation and support for partial deposits, Hoodi testnet & Python 3.14
Lido: optimizing validator exits (7k validator case study), minimize staking reward loss via coordinated voluntary exits, batch execution & sweep-cycle-aware timing
Serenita Vero v1.4.0 (multi-node validator client): block proposal improvements (using Rust & SSZ encoding) and new CLI flags
Sigma Prime Anchor (SSV client): considered viable option for Lido SSV-based setups
Client diversity:
- Consensus layer: Lighthouse ~53% (data may not be accurate)
Staking market share: Lido 21.8% [Note: dual governance]
Validators: 898k active (target 128k), 12k accumulating (0x02 withdrawal credentials)
Client releases:
- Execution layer:
  - Lambda ethrex v11.0.0: 12-15% sync-throughput improvement on full sync
  - Nethermind 1.37.2 (recommended): fixes healthcheck & archive invalid block issues in 1.37.1

Linux Foundation Decentralized Trust Lineth (Linea Stack): joining as incubating project
ZKsync Lite sunset, block production stopped
L2Beat Stages for Validiums & Optimiums, all currently at Stage 0
Luca Donno (L2Beat) native proof verification, proposal to derisk & simplify L2 bridges

US crypto market structure legislation (Clarity act): bipartisan compromise on yield, prohibits stablecoin rewards from resembling deposit interest but allows other forms of rewards

Ethereal news weekly #22