The Shapella hard fork has been officially implemented on the ethereum mainnet meaning ethereum validators can finally withdraw their staked ether, from the beacon chain.
The long-awaited upgrade went into effect on April 12 at 10:27 PM UTC in Epoch 194,048. According to data from ethereum block explorer beaconchai.in, a total of 12,859 ether was unlocked in 4,333 withdrawals within the first hour of the hard fork. Currently, approximately 44% of validators, or 248,043 out of 559,549 active validators, can request a partial or full withdrawal.
Most of the withdrawals at this time were between 2.8 and 3.2 ETH, which indicates that withdrawals at this time are mainly staking rewards. According to Rated Network Explorer, only 3,996 validators registered to dequeue before the Shapella hard fork went into effect.
According to blockchain analytics firm Nansen, cryptocurrency exchange Huobi holds the largest share of the total amount of ether that can be withdrawn at 30 percent, followed by decentralized autonomous organization PieDAO at 17.7 percent. Nansen data shows that a total of 284,622 Ether is awaiting full withdrawal from 7,948 validators.
The price of ether, currently at $1,920, was little changed in the first hour after the hard fork, as predicted by blockchain intelligence platform Glassnode in an April 11 report. According to the Ethereum Foundation, the hard fork could theoretically unlock 18.1 million ether on the beacon chain, currently worth more than $34.8 billion, however, there are several mechanisms that prevent a flood of ether from flooding the market.
In its report, Glassnode estimates that less than 1% of the total will be released in the first week, and the 12,859 ether unlocked in the first hour represents only 0.07% of the total amount of ether staked in the beacon chain. Through Ethereum Investment Proposal EIP-4895, pledged ether is pushed from the beacon chain to the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), also known as the execution layer, making withdrawals possible.
This is the most significant upgrade since the September 15th merger, and it brings Ethereum one step closer to a fully functional proof-of-stake system.
