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Ethereal news weekly #40

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US SEC innovation exemption for trading tokenized stocks on permissioned AMMs, S&P Global acquiring OpenZeppelin, Blockspace Forum multi party block construction live

Ecosystem

MetaMask Added Protection MetaMask now prevents red pill attacks with new Added Protection security feature

The first self-custody wallet to guarantee an Ethereum or EVM app transaction matches its preview, or it reverts, and your funds stay put.

MetaMask Added Protection

Enterprise

Applications

  • Aave custodied collateral lending proposal, allow institutions to borrow stablecoins against assets held in custody at Anchorage, new isolated hub & spoke
  • Balancer wind down proposal, v3 revenue hasn’t replaced v2, withdrawals only from October 30, distribute treasury (~$9M) to BAL token holders after costs starting May 2027

Developers

  • Argot Collective Fe 26.3 (language): adds first class memory pointers, array & ERC20 helpers, rebuilding from contract metadata (for source verification) and source level debugging foundations (bytecode to source attribution & export to Fe ethdebug view)
  • Foundry v1.8.3 (dev framework):
    • Glamsterdam upgrade support expanded (adds EIP8037 state gas reporting, getSlotNumber & rollSlot for EIP7843 block slot number and EIP7928 block access list hash in eth_simulateV1 block headers)
    • Adds Safe & ERC4626 vault commands to cast
  • Taek Lee (ZeroDev) FrameTx toolkit: write & test Frame transactions with Foundry, uses patched solc, Foundry & revm, account & paymaster examples, experimental
    • vFrame (Solidity entry point): test Frame style transactions on stock EVM using ERC4337 style flow, demo on Sepolia testnet
  • Solidity Labs Forge proposal simulator v1 (tool): records proposal actions from Solidity calls, encodes, simulates & validates; supports Safe, OpenZeppelin timelock, Governor Bravo & OpenZeppelin Governor
  • WINTΞR: EVM from scratch (course), $99 ($39.60 with early bird discount)
  • Colosseum crypto world’s fair (hackathon), tracks for Ethereum, Arbitrum, Base & Robinhood Chain, submissions due October 12
  • Application layer standards (ERCs):
    • ERC8416: Epoch based fixed rate vault
    • ERC8418: Itemized non fungible token

Security

  • Nostra ~$3.5M money market exploit on Starknet via NSTR price oracle manipulation
  • Cozy ~$170k exploit of two v2 protection market Sets on Optimism, false oracle proposals went unchallenged for 5 days
  • Monad Ultrafuzz (orchestrator): contract fuzzing & threat hunting
  • TheDAO Security Fund ETHSecurity initiatives (grants & RFPs): propose an initiative, fund an initiative or bid to build an RFP, third of each budget must go to adoption milestones, round finishes at end of January
    • Grants include: formally verified Vyper compiler & privacy preserving EDR
    • RFPs include: provider independent client verified ENS resolution & local first Safe UI

All core devs (main protocol calls)

All core devs - consensus (ACDC) #187

  • Alex Stokes is back facilitating ACDC
  • Glamsterdam upgrade (targeting 2026):
    • mplex deprecation: enable QUIC by default then deprecate after Glamsterdam
    • Sepolia testnet: upgrade October 6, client release by September 29
    • Hoodi testnet: targeting October 27, dependent on Sepolia upgrade
  • Hegotá upgrade (targeting 2027):

All core devs - testing (ACDT) #96 + consensus layer breakout

  • Glamsterdam upgrade (targeting 2026):
    • glamsterdam-devnet-11: upgraded with no issues, Lido & Optimism tested transition
    • Sepolia testnet shadow fork: targeting next week

Layer 1

  • Hegotá upgrade (targeting 2027):
    • FOCIL breakout #42: focil-devnet-0 launch once interop issue resolved, in parallel work on FOCIL & Frame transactions interaction
    • Terence (Prysm): primitives that help shorter slots, faster broadcast, make nodes do less work, pipeline broadcast, state preparation & execution and reduce validator work on critical path
  • Blockspace Forum multi party block construction (MPBC) live, most valuable block is expanded with transactions from multiple builders, initially append only, dashboard

Staking

  • Lido first validator consolidation, migration started for 260k validators to 0x02 credentials
  • Client diversity:
    • Consensus layer: Lighthouse ~52% (data may not be accurate)
  • Staking market share: Lido 21.6% [Note: dual governance]
  • Validators: 911k active (target 128k), 19k accumulating (0x02 withdrawal credentials)
  • Client releases:
    • Consensus layer:
      • ChainSafe Lodestar v1.48.0 (strongly recommended): adds flat file storage for PeerDAS data columns & faster block processing
      • Consensys Teku 26.9.0 (recommended): external signer concurrent limit flag promoted (maximum 1024), removes deposit snapshot CLI options & adds Platåberget devnet support
    • Execution layer:
      • Lambda ethrex v27.0.0: bootnodes updated, state & block overrides in RPC simulation, simulated calls no longer refused, clearer RPC errors and stateless validator guests upgraded to ERE v0.17
      • Paradigm Reth v2.6.0 (low): expands Glamsterdam & Hegotá support, REST-SSZ Engine API installed by default, advances EIP8189 snap sync and partial persistence enabled by default

Layer 2

Regulation

General

  • Austin Griffith (EF) Picowallet: DIY hardware wallet for USDS stablecoin, uses three off the shelf parts, no soldering required, proof of concept

Editor: @abcoathup
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Ethereal news weekly #39