Santiment: more than 45% of nodes on the Ethereum network managed by two addresses

What’s new? According to analytics company Santiment, after Ethereum switched to the Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus algorithm, 45,15% of nodes on the network are associated with just two addresses. According to experts, the first address validated about 188 blocks (28,97%) and the second address validated about 105 (16,18%).

📊 According to our #Ethereum Post Merge Inflation dashboard, 46.15% of the #proofofstake nodes for storing data, processing transactions, and adding new #blockchain blocks can be attributed to just two addresses. This heavy dominance by these addresses is something to watch. pic.twitter.com/KQdFNgGloD— Santiment (@santimentfeed) September 15, 2022

Community opinion. Under Santiment’s Twitter post, users were divided in their opinions: some believe that Ethereum’s decentralization may be in jeopardy, while others argue that the analysts’ data is inaccurate.

One of the users stated that these addresses could be relays and actually consist of thousands of validators. Another suggested that these wallets could belong to the non-profit Ethereum Foundation and investment bank JPMorgan.

What a lazy article. These are flashbot relay's. Relays are made up of tens of thousands of people or in other words validators but because its 1 relayer, it shows up as 1 proposer of blocks on the network— timjanssen.eth (@thwjanssen89) September 15, 2022

What is known about the Ethereum upgrade? The upgrade took place around 06:40 UTC on September 15. Due to the algorithm change, the way coins are earned on the network changed to staking. In August, the developers reported that after the upgrade, the transaction speed and fees on the network will remain at the same levels. ETH can only be unstaked after the next update, called Shanghai.

The fee for issuing the first NFT after the upgrade was 36 ETH (about $58 000 at the time of the transaction). Also, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said that the network’s transition to PoS reduced global electricity consumption by 0,2%.

As of September 16, 08:25 UTC, ETH is trading at $1465, down by 8,94% in 24 hours, according to Binance. The cryptocurrency’s market capitalization is $179,8 billion.

To find out how the Ethereum upgrade will affect the cryptocurrency market, see GetBlock Magazine’s article.