Key Points
- Sepolia testnet is the latest test phase before the mainnet launch expected in April.
- A second DeFi summer could be on the horizon.
Ethereum developers have activated the Pectra upgrade on the Sepolia testnet ahead of the mainnet launch which is expected to take place in April.
Despite ETH’s recent losses that have heavily impacted holders amidst recent market declines, optimism remains in the crypto industry.
Ethereum Pectra Upgrade Was Activated on Sepolia Testnet
The upcoming Pectra upgrade for Ethereum was activated on the Sepolia testnet earlier today. The Pectra upgrade will improve the scalability, security, and usability of the Ethereum network.
The Sepolia testnet tests the upgrade’s features under simulated network conditions ahead of Ethereum’s mainnet deployment.
The testnet is the last important rollout before the upgrade will launch on the mainnet probably sometime in April.
This is Pectra’s second phase of testnet activations after its rollout on the Holesky testnet on February 24. Sepolia’s Holesky rollout was surrounded by problems due to an issue with incorrect deposit contract addresses in execution clients triggering chain splits and delayed finality.
Devs addressed the problem and are currently working to stabilize the network. Following these issues, the Pectra rollout on Sepolia took place today.
Pectra Upgrade to Boost Ethereum’s Scalability
The Pectra upgrade continues the March 2024 Dencun hard fork which reduced L2 fees, keeping Ethereum competitive.
Pectra’s key changes for Ethereum include the following:
- Improvements to the crypto wallets’ UX
- Account abstraction via EIP-7702
- Raising the upper limit for validator stakes from 32 to 2,048 ETH via EIP-7251
- Boosting the maximum blob count to advanced rollup scalability via EIP-7691
Devs are expected to finalize a final date for the mainnet activation this week, on Thursday, during the All Core Developers (ACD) call, and a potential mainnet fork is scheduled for next month.
Ethereum’s Recent Price Trajectory
Regarding ETH’s recent price trajectory, the coin is down by over 10% in the past seven days. While ETH’s price peaked above $2,500 on March 3rd, its price declined significantly close to $2,000 yesterday, March 4, before a rebound today.
Today, ETH is up by over 7%, trading above $2,200.
On March 2nd, ETH recorded a price surge of around 13% after US President Donald Trump mentioned the coin regarding a US Crypto Reserve, along with BTC, ADA, XRP, and SOL.
His statements boosted the entire crypto market significantly before this week’s decline due to tariffs on Mexico, Canada, and China, among other factors.
WLFI, Also Affected by the Recent Market Pullback
The latest market decline also affected Trump’s WLFI crypto project, as revealed by on-chain data analyst ai_9684xtpa.
In a post on X earlier today, the analyst noted that WLFI’s tokens lost over $87,8 million and the largest loss was the ETH position which lost around $67 million, representing 76% of the total losses.
The analyst also noted that WLFI has not increased its token holdings for 13 days, and is wondering whether we can still see a DeFi spring of DeFi under Trump’s term.
Is a 2nd DeFi Summer Possible?
However, optimism remains present in the crypto market as it recorded a rebound of over 5% today.
Yesterday, the White House revealed that it supports the resolution to overturn IRS “Broker DeFi Rule”, an important milestone for the industry.
Also, the crypto industry eagerly awaits the March 7 event – President Trump will hold a Crypto Summit which will gather important names in the industry including Michael Saylor, Bitcoin Magazine’s David Bailey, Paradigm’s co-founder, Matt Huang, CEO of Exodus Wallet, JP Richardson, the co-founder of WLFI, Zach Witkoff and more.
The CEOs of Kraken, Coinbase, and Robinhood will also be present, according to Eleanor Terret, Fox Business journalist.
March is a key month for the crypto industry, potentially bringing a DeFi spring/summer, marking a high rate of adoption and innovation comparable to the 2020 DeFi summer, but this time with a boost from AI.
