Quick take:
- The rate of Ethereum deposits to the ETH 2.0 contract points to a January 15th launch
- 104,128 ETH has been sent to the deposit contract which is 19.86% of the required total amount
- However, events are not always linear and ETH whales could be waiting till the last minute to deposit their Ethereum
- Ethereum locked to launch Phase 0 will not be available till Phase 1
The rate at which Ethereum deposits are being made to the ETH2.0 deposit contract has been calculated as 301.13 ETH per hour by the team at CryptoQuant. This means that it will take approximately 58 days for the 524,288 ETH target to be achieved for the activation of Phase 0 of the Ethereum upgrade. If the rate of Ethereum deposits remains constant, ETH2.0 could eventually launch on January 15th, 2021.
The team at CryptoQuant.com also estimates that the minimum number of validators for the deployment of ETH2.0, will also be achieved on this date. Their analysis was shared via the following two tweets and accompanying charts.
We'll see 16,384 validators on Jan 15, 2021 as well. pic.twitter.com/sMaSBmK2Lp
— CryptoQuant.com (@cryptoquant_com) November 19, 2020
Possibility of Ethereum Whales Waiting till the Last Minute
Phase 0 of ETH2.0 is scheduled for a December 1st launch. Ethereum validators are requested to send their 32 ETH seven days prior to this date to ensure a timely release of this phase of the upgrade. Doing the math, there are approximately 5 days left for would-be participants to meet the seven-day requirement for Phase 0 to kick off on December 1st.
At the time of writing, 104,128 Ethereum have been deposited to the ETH 2.0 address thus signifying the process is approximately 19.6% complete with only 5 days left. Perhaps Ethereum whales are waiting till the last minute to send the rest of the Ethereum required for the launch on December 1st.
The same Ethereum whales could have their ETH locked up in various DeFi protocols and are attempting to maximize their yields as it might take a while to unlock their funds once sent to the ETH2.0 deposit address.