Thread by @shegenerates

Updated FAQ thread on The Merge. 🔀
I hope someone finds this helpful, please ask more questions in the comments!

1. Is it priced in?
This isnt about that 🙃 lets talk about how it works and whats going to happen. ¹/¹³

2. Are there new risks The Merge creates to using certain smart contracts?

There shouldnt be in terms of technical risk. We’ve now tested merging on several ghost forks of mainnet and test networks, without finding any new contract vulnerabilities

See: blog.ethereum.org/2021/11/29/how…

3. Will this instantly increase the number of transactions per second Ethereum can do?

No, that will come later. The Merge replaces proof of work consensus with proof of stake consensus, mostly changing how transactions are verified, not what they do.

4. Will this instantly make Ethereum cheaper to use?

Short answer: No.
Transaction fees on ethereum are priced according to a market of supply and demand. Since the number of tx’s will probably be about the same, the tx fees will probably be similar too.

5. When does Proof Of Stake start for Ethereum?
The Beaconchain, a proof of stake network, has been running in parallel to Ethereum successfully continuously for 𝟱𝟵𝟰 𝗱𝗮𝘆𝘀.
It’s already live!

The Merge combines this with mainnet ethereum, and turns off Proof Of Work.

6. Will the energy savings really be as big as 99% like people are talking about?

Probably more, nearly all of the energy used to power ethereum is for Proof of Work. Some estimates have it as a 99.97% energy use reduction.

The Merge is good for the world!

7. Is Proof of Stake a way for the rich to get richer, since they already have capital to stake?

This is a great philosophical question, and in theory I say yes. We should continue to research more fair, energy efficient consensus mechanisms.

In practice though...

Existing Proof Of Work algorithms that bitcoin and ethereum use actually have higher returns on capital when buying mining infra + electricity than Ethereum PoS.

Because of that, I dont see this upgrade as a problem of rich getting richer.

8. How much ETH will be staked? Is it enough to secure the network?

Currently there is 13,090,961 ETH staked.
Nearly 10% of the circulating supply of ETH, or $19,331,445,000 USD at current prices. I think that's quite a lot.

9. What day will The Merge happen exactly?
~September
The time it happens is based on block difficulty, not a set date. So anyone saying they know exactly when it will happen is lying.
Theres 1 final test network to merge (goerli) & then we will collectively set a target.

10. From a user perspective, do I have to upgrade my wallet or change anything?

No. As a regular user, your experience will not really change. Any website that asks you to “upgrade your eth” or anything similar is trying to scam you. Be vigilant

11. Will MEV go away with staking?

I would say definitely not, the people running MEV bots have too much riding on ethereum to just go away. There will likely be new MEV clients and new creative strats that we havent even seen yet.

12. When does ethereum start becoming super scalable, if not at the merge?

It already is! There are a bunch of great rollups and side chains like Arbitrum, Optimism, Gnosis Chain, and Polygon, where tx’s are cheap and still secure.
These are part of the scaling effort.

Reminder: Sharding and other upgrades to Ethereum mainnet will happen later, likely 2 years from now as theres still a lot of research to do.

13. Something about a halvening?
On PoW chains like eth or btc, every block has a miner reward (issuance). BTC has halvenings, where the reward per block halves.

The Merge could have similar effect since we expect ETH issuance to go down by quite a lot in the coming months.

Let me know if you found this helpful or have other questions!

I will continue to do my best to clear up rumors and post updates as they are available

14. Does the Merge make Ethereum "deflationary"?

Not exactly, or at least not automatically. Part of the tx fees paid on ethereum get deleted (burned). When the issuance to ethereum decreases, it could be deflationary (many expect it to be). But its not programmed in.