Week in Ethereum News

January 30, 2026

Highlight of the Week

• ACDE #229 (Jan 29) pushed Glamsterdam devnet-2 readiness forward (devnet-2 updates, BAL client optimization work, and repricings scoping), plus surfaced multiple new breakout-track items as active threads for the coming weeks.

Eth R&D Protocol Call(s)

• All Core Devs – Testing (ACDT) #67 (Jan 26)

  • Glamsterdam (BAL devnet-2):

    • Reference tests release status + devnet progress update and follow-ups.

    • ePBS devnet-0: discussion of a standardized ePBS Beacon API (incl. linked comment/PR from the agenda).

  • Gas benchmarking updates:

    • Status updates were on the agenda; teams shared benchmarking progress (see agenda/linked comment chain).

  • Process:

    • Continued discussion on the CFI → devnet process.

• All Core Devs – Execution (ACDE) #229 (Jan 29)

  • Breakout calls / deep-dives surfaced this week:

    • Post-Quantum Transaction Signatures (PQTS) (breakout-track).

    • L1-zkEVM (breakout-track).

    • Glamsterdam repricings (breakout-track).

  • Glamsterdam:

    • devnet-2 updates + BAL client optimizations (parallel execution/batch reads/parallel state root calc/sync) were explicitly in-scope for discussion.

    • “CFI EIP priorities for future devnets” and scoping work were discussed as inputs to future devnet planning.

  • Hegota headliner proposals:

    • Call agenda included headliner proposal presentations (EEM, Frame Transactions, SSZ execution blocks) and pointed to the next ACDC for FOCIL-related discussion.

Fusaka (Osaka + Fulu) upgrade

• Stateless Implementers Call #47 (Jan 27) — implementers discussed statelessness roadmap implications and an alternative in-protocol state expiry proposal (agenda items for the call).

Layer 1

• FOCIL Breakout #27 (Jan 27)

  • Rebased FOCIL-on-ePBS was discussed; participants aligned that major FOCIL progress likely depends on a stable ePBS devnet, with plans to revisit after early PBS devnet work and compare approaches across client teams.

  • Follow-up posts linked a FOCIL headliner proposal for Hegotá and additional summary resources.

• L1-zkEVM Breakout #01 (scheduled Feb 11) — kickoff call announced this week.

Research

• State expiry & state growth management:

  • What if we only kept 1 year of active state? — a “what-if” benchmark using ~1 year of mainnet workload reported large state-size reduction and execution/tail-latency improvements when retaining only recently-touched state.

• Censorship resistance & inclusion lists:

  • zkFOCIL: Implementation & Benchmarking Report — implementation/benchmarks of a ring-signature-based approach for anonymous inclusion-list committee participation, comparing proving/verification trade-offs across setups.

• Rollups / preconfirmations:

  • Combining preconfirmations with based rollups for synchronous composability — discussion exploring how preconfirmations might interact with based rollups to enable tighter composability.

Layer 2

• Optimism governance approved an OP token buyback plan that ties future OP buybacks directly to Superchain-generated revenue, marking a step toward a more sustainable token value model funded by ecosystem cash flows rather than inflation or treasury drawdowns

Stuff for Developers

• Hardhat v2.28.4 shipped a bug fix so hardhat_reset can correctly switch from local mode to forking mode.

Security

• SwapNet router exploit drained up to ~$13.3M (some estimates higher) from users interacting via Matcha Meta on Base; Matcha Meta urged affected users to revoke approvals.

• Matcha Meta’s incident statement on X said SwapNet contracts were temporarily disabled as a precaution while teams investigated the exploit, coordinated response efforts, and worked to assess the full scope of impacted users and funds.

Ecosystem

• The Ethereum Foundation published a Q4 2025 allocation update outlining recent grant distributions across core ecosystem priorities, including protocol R&D, developer tooling, community initiatives, and long-term public goods funding.

Centralization watch: threatening the value of your ETH

• 🚨 Lido at 23.61%, still too close to the 33.3% threshold.

• Client diversity (via clientdiversity.org):

  • Execution layer: Geth ~41% & Nethermind ~38%

  • Consensus layer: Lighthouse ~37.6% & Erigon ~26%

• Any client bug over 33.3% could mean loss of finality.

• Better geographic diversity is optimal, particularly outside of North America & Europe.

EIPs/Standards

• EIPs (Core, Networking, Interface):

  • EIP-7942 — Corrected parent_root assignment in AA selection: updated this week to fix an error in how parent_root is assigned in the account abstraction selection logic.

  • EIP-7928 — Further clarified access: received additional specification clarification around access rules and intended behavior.

  • EIP-8030 — Added EIP-7951 to requires header: updated dependencies by explicitly listing EIP-7951 in the proposal’s requires metadata.

• ERCs (Application Layer):

  • EIP-8141 — Fixed status field number: minor editorial correction to the proposal’s status field formatting.

  • EIP-8052 — Improvements and test vectors: updated this week with additional refinements and new test vectors to improve implementer clarity.

  • EIP-7708 — Clarified order of burn logs and coinbase transfer logs: specification update clarifying execution log ordering between burn events and coinbase transfer logs.

Onchain Stats

• Fees (via ultrasound.money):

  • Gas: 0.0 to 7.9 gwei, 0.2 gwei average; zero net issuance at 12.4 gwei

  • 121.4k ETH net issuance this week

• ETHUSD: $2,676–$3,034, currently $2,672, all-time high $4,946

• ETHBTC: currently 0.032 (Flippening at ~0.165)

Regulation/Business/Tokens

• Fidelity’s “FIDD” stablecoin launch on Ethereum: CoinSpeaker reports Fidelity announced the stablecoin launch within the past week, framing it as part of growing competition among large issuers under the evolving U.S. stablecoin regime.

Upcoming Dates of Note

• February 17-21, 2026: ETHDenver BUIDLWeek - The world's largest Web3 developer conference and hackathon in Denver, Colorado.

• Mar 30 – Apr 2, 2026: EthCC 9 (Ethereum Community Conference): Europe’s largest Ethereum-focused conference, with strong research and developer tracks.

• April 29–30, 2026: TOKEN2049 Dubai: major global crypto and Web3 industry conference.