In an announcement earlier today, popular cryptocurrency exchange of Binance announced that it iwas on track to support the upcoming Constantinople/St. Petersburg Upgrade on the Ethereum network. The upgrade to the ETH network is scheduled for block height 7,280,000 that has been estimated to occur tomorrow, 28th February 2018.
The exchange has also advised ETH holders that the exchange will handle all technical requirements during the upgrade. Users of the exchange should also leave sufficient time for deposits to be processed in full before the upgrade is triggered on the stated block height.
What Exactly is the Constantinople/St. Petersburg Upgrade?
The new upgrade of the Ethereum network has two names because the initial Constantinople Upgrade was postponed after potential security issue were detected on January 15th this year. The upgrade was initially set to be triggered at block height 7,080,000 on the 16th of January.
The Constantinople upgrade will implement the following Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs).
- EIP 145: Bitwise shifting instructions in the Ethereum Virtual Machine – this EIP will make it cheaper and easier to do certain transactions on the network through the EVM
- EIP 1014: Skinny CREATE2 – will allow you to interact with addresses that have not yet been created
- EIP 1052: EXTCODEHASH opcode – reduces the gas needed for certain transactions
- EIP 1234: Constantinople Difficulty Bomb Delay and Block Reward adjustment – this EIP will delay the difficulty bomb for another 12 months and reduce the block rewards in preparation for the eventual implementation of a Proof of Stake algorithm
The St. Petersburg portion of the upgrade removes EIP 1283 from all test networks. This EIP was the one that had been identified as has having security vulnerabilities. EIP 1283 introduced cheaper gas costs for STORE operations on the network. The upgrade to remove EIP 1283 will be carried out at the same time as the Constantinople portion adding the 4 aforementioned EIPs.
ETH Value Before the Upgrade
Earlier in the month, ETH managed to reclaim the number 2 position from XRP due to the buzz surrounding the pending upgrade that happens tomorrow. ETH is currently valued at $139 up from $120 levels in mid February. Many investors and enthusiasts believe that these upgrades will bring with them the much needed trust and interest in investing in the digital asset and developing DApps on the platform.
What are your thoughts on the Constantinople and St. Petersburg upgrades? Will the value of ETH benefit from the improvements? Please let us know in the comment section below.
Disclaimer: This article is not meant to give financial advice. Any additional opinion herein is purely the author’s and does not represent the opinion of Ethereum World News or any of its other writers. Please carry out your own research before investing in any of the numerous cryptocurrencies available. Thank you.
