Analysis of Ethereum Technology Development Trends and Investment Opportunities

Looking back at history, the cutting-edge technology discussions within the Ethereum developer community often evolve into everyday application products, such as DEX, lending, rollup, and DA, etc. This trend also provides opportunities for investment layout. This article will explore the valuable information that may be captured from the technical discussions on the Ethereum roadmap, the recent DevCon conference, and the upcoming Pectra upgrade.

Ethereum Roadmap Analysis

The Ethereum roadmap has always been an important reference for observing future development directions, including phases such as The Merge, The Surge, The Scourge, The Verge, The Purge, and The Splurge. The main content of each phase is as follows:

1. The Merge: Completing the merger of the execution layer and the consensus layer, achieving the transition from PoW to PoS.
2. The Surge: Focus on future scalability, improving the underlying to better serve rollups.
3. The Scourge: Dedicated to reducing MEV-related issues.
4. The Verge: Includes the change of the underlying structure from Merkle tree to Verkle tree and the Snarkification of EVM.
5. The Purge: Reduce the pressure of data storage and state maintenance on nodes by deleting or archiving historical data.
6. The Splurge: Involves cutting-edge improvements related to the EVM layer, account abstraction, and other cryptographic applications.

DevCon Conference Highlights

At the DevCon conference, Beam Chain became the focus, proposing numerous underlying improvements such as underlying Snarkification, improved block generation, and staking, among others. However, its completion will take about 5 years.

The topic of Rollups remains popular, mainly discussing the liquidity fragmentation and interaction issues between rollups. In addition, the maturity of L2 technology, chain abstraction, pre-confirmation, cryptographic applications, and future upgrades are also receiving attention.

Highlights of Pectra Upgrade

The Pectra upgrade expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2025 includes several transformations:

1. EIP-7702(AA): Grants all EOA accounts the ability to temporarily transform into smart contract accounts.
2. EIP-7691: Increase the number of blobs per block to further reduce rollup costs.
3. EIP-7251: Increase the staking limit from 32 Ether to 2048 Ether.

Future Opportunities

1. Interoperability between Rollups:

   • Based rollup
   • Shared sequencer
   • Cross-chain intents

2. Account Abstraction: The activation of EIP-7702 will provide new opportunities for the AA project, potentially allowing for the construction of more complex cross-chain or multi-chain interaction functionalities by combining features such as chain abstraction and intents.

3. Cryptographic Applications:

   • The zkEVM and zkVM frameworks are gradually maturing.
   • ZKP combined with MPC, FHE, etc. may bring more application combinations.
   • Indistinguishable confusion (iO) and other cutting-edge technologies may receive more attention.
   • Verification applications such as ZK Email and zkTLS may gain more adoption.

As technology continues to evolve, these sectors may see new market competition and opportunities by 2025. Investors and developers should closely monitor these trends to seize potential opportunities.