The penultimate test run before Ethereum validators can withdraw their Ether $1,714 from the Beacon Chain took place with the Shapella hard fork on the Goerli testnet.
Yet there were problems with the hard fork. Tim Beiko, an Ethereum core engineer, highlighted that a number of testnet validators didn’t update their client software prior to the Goerli fork, which made the processing of deposits less efficient than it could have been.
He attributed it to testnet validators having “less incentive” to update because the Goerli ETH “is worthless,” but he anticipates validators will make the necessary changes before the fork on the Ethereum mainnet.
Shapella’s fork onto the Goerli testnet took 15 epochs since network participation was below the two-thirds barrier, according to Ethereum researcher “terence.eth”:
Staked ETH from the Beacon Chain will be “pushed” to the execution layer via Ethereum Investment Proposal EIP-4895.
EIP-4895 has been the most eagerly awaited of the five EIPs that make up the Shapella upgrade because it brings Ethereum one step closer to a fully functional proof-of-stake system. After a few hiccups in getting the Sepolia and Goerli testnets ready for the fork, Shapella is anticipated to go into effect on the Ethereum mainnet in the first part of April.
When Shapella is split, the hard fork will theoretically liberate 17.6 million ETH, or more than $30 billion at the current exchange rate, and will permit both partial and complete withdrawals. According to the Ethereum Foundation, many safeguards are in place to stop a surge in ETH supply from reaching the market.
