Ethereum Weekly Digest, August 10, 2025
Eth News and Updates
Eth R&D protocol call (All Core Devs)
Consensus layer focused protocol call (ACDC #162):
Fusaka DevNets and BPO: DevNet 3 ran non‑finality scenarios, and DevNet 4 will gather day‑by‑day datasets to assess PeerDAS scaling. A single‑phase BPO plan was outlined, with a second phase in 2026 to approach 8× throughput.
Glamsterdam Headliner Choice: ePBS (EIP‑7732) was SFI’d as the CL headliner, and FOCIL (EIP‑7805) was CFI’d to rebase on ePBS and be considered later.
Slot Timing Refactor: A spec PR will drop “intervals per slot” and define deadlines as percentages of the slot via configuration variables. It doesn’t change current behavior but unblocks ePBS and six‑second‑slot work, and several teams want it merged soon.
Six‑Second Slot Metrics: With corrected sources, 95th‑percentile block propagation (excluding relay publishing) was ~865 ms on community nodes, matching internal measurements. Missed‑slot attestation arrivals improved from ~2.5 s to ~1.85 s at the 95th percentile after a large operator fixed a misconfiguration; analysis and optimizations continue.
Layer1
Consensus specs upgrade to v1.6.0-alpha.4: Fulu/EIP-7732/EIP-7805/EIP-7916
PQ Interop Breakout Room Call #04
3SF Mini Interop: A PR adapts Vitalik’s 3SF Mini to SSZ (removing optionals and switching string hashes to bytes32) to enable cross‑client compatibility. Client teams were asked to review and converge on types to ensure smooth interop.
Optionals vs Containers: Some teams want to keep SSZ optionals to stay close to the spec, while Nimbus advocates using stable containers instead. The implementing team will re‑evaluate supporting optionals and report back with implications.
DevNet‑0 Setup Decisions: For peer discovery, the group favored a fixed peer set to minimize moving parts. Placeholder SNARK data and “block adaptation inclusion” remain to be defined with minimal formats and procedures.
Layer2
L2 Interop Working Group Call #12
ZK Finality Client: Boundless introduced a ZK finality client that outputs verifiable Ethereum checkpoint hashes and enables trust‑minimized, cross‑chain computation over Ethereum state. Costs/latency continue to drop, and the team will provide contracts/API keys and operate it as a public good to accelerate integrations.
Intent Standards Stack: The Open Intents Framework is aligning with ERC‑7683 and shipping modular contracts, a baseline solver, unified quote/status APIs, and SDKs so wallets and apps share one interoperable interface. An optional off‑chain aggregator and “multi‑chain inputs” aim to prevent asset sprawl while remaining solver‑agnostic.
TEE Fast Interop: Proposed a fast path that reorgs with L1, secures execution via restaked AVS and TEEs, and only requires a ZK proof when value‑at‑risk nears the economic security budget. Next up is mainnet rollout of seconds‑level ERC‑7683 settlement plus formal thresholds and safeguards.
EIPs/ERCs
EIPs (Ethereum improvement proposals):
ERCs (application layer):
Client Release
Consensus Layer
Lodestar v1.33.0: upgrade to libp2p, enabling proposer boost reorg by default
Execution Layer
Geth v1.16.2: includes implementations of the Fusaka EIPs
Ecosystem
Protocol Update – Scale L1: Mainnet’s gas limit increased to 45M post-Berlinterop; Block-Level Access Lists (BALs) are being considered as a headliner for Glamsterdam
The Succinct Prover Network is live on mainnet
Research & Paper
The Ethereum Foundation’s Scale L1 update highlights progress toward raising the mainnet gas limit to 100M, starting with 45M today. Key steps include reducing node storage with History Expiry, testing Block-Level Access Lists for faster execution, improving performance through benchmarking and repricing, and developing a zkEVM attester client for future zk-based validation.
Ethereum’s ePBS “free option” shows low average impact (~3.67 ETH/day, 0.82% exercise rate) but sharp spikes during volatility (>40 ETH/day, >3.5%). Non-CEX-DEX MEV currently limits the issue, though some builders and high CEX-DEX flow days show higher risk. Shortening the option window or adding penalties greatly reduces incentives, especially in volatile markets.
Stats
Fees:
Gas: 0.1 to 11.0 gwei, 0.6 gwei average; zero net issuance at 16.3 gwei
18.0k ETH net issuance this week
ETHUSD: $3,473 – $4,301, currently $4,196, all time high $4,878
ETH/BTC: currently 0.036 (Flippening at ~0.165)
L2 Total Value Locked: 10.23 M ETH, -6.93% in 7 days
ETH ETF: 74.69K ETH net inflow (Aug 4 – Aug 7)