anticipating the new Ethereum update: Tomorrow these cryptocurrencies will be good to throw away

By: Bharggavi Ssayee

August 5, 2021 9:15 AM

An update that will bury some tokens? - The Ethereum (ETH) network is preparing to deploy the hard fork London within days. In practice, this update will bring several major changes to the protocol. Among these, adaptations that will make gas tokens obsolete, causing a major impact on their value as an asset.

August 4, 2021: the fateful date

On August 4 - in other words, tomorrow - the long-awaited hard fork London will be deployed on the Ethereum network. Its activation should take place in block 12965000, between 1 p.m. and 5 p.m. (GMT). In addition to the controversial EIP 1559, this hard fork will feature several other proposals, such as EIP 3529 to change the refund system on Ethereum.

“The way Ethereum works today is if you store data on Ethereum, when you remove that data from the network, you get a small gas refund in return to get people to clean up after them. "

Ethereum developer Tim Beiko explained

Some projects have thus decided to take advantage of this mechanism by creating what are commonly called gas tokens or gas tokens. In fact, these tokens are created when the gas cost is low on the Ethereum network. So when the gas comes up, users can destroy those tokens and reclaim space on Ethereum as well as part of the fees to pay for a transaction.

Although the idea of reimbursement may have seemed interesting when it was first created, the emergence of gas tokens quickly led to a situation in which fees stagnated at high levels.

EIP 1329: withdrawal of reimbursement

In practice, this EIP will result in the removal of 2 Solidity functions: SELFDESTRUCT and SSTORE.

In the case of gas tokens, the SSTORE function makes it possible to store data in the blockchain when the gas cost is low and, therefore, to create the gas tokens. SELFDESCTRUCT is called when the tokens are destroyed to recover the gas they "contained".

Therefore, all gas tokens, such as CHI or Gas Token Two (GST2) will no longer be of any use on Ethereum.

“I remind you that if you have any gas tokens ($ CHI, $ GST2), they will become literally worthless in a few days when London is deployed. "

Alex kroeger

However, it is still too early to know whether these will retain any value, although they will become unnecessary.

At the time of writing, the CHI is peaking at $ 0.45 per unit, a far cry from its ATH of $ 9.53 reached last February. The GST2, meanwhile, is trading at around $ 88 after also falling sharply from its ATH to $ 672 last April.

For its part, EIP 1559, which aims to modify the fee system on Ethereum, is awaited with anguish by miners. According to several analyzes, this PIE will inevitably lead to a decrease in their income. Another bad news, with the approach of the transition to proof of stake (PoS) which will make minors outright obsolete on Vitalik Buterin's network.