In the first four days after the Shapella hard fork, more than 1 million Ether worth $2.1 billion has been withdrawn from Ethereum’s Beacon Chain, with Ether surpassing $2,100 for the first time in 11 months.
According to data from beaconcha.in, 1.03 million ETH withdrawals were made through 473,7000 withdrawal requests, with Saturday, April 15th seeing the highest withdrawal day at 392,800 ETH.
Of the active validators, almost 87%, or 469,000 out of 540,000 are now eligible to withdraw their staked Ether.
Even though the Ethereum community had mixed opinions on how Shapella would affect Ether’s price, the first four days have resulted in a nearly 10% increase.
These numbers come as no surprise to Lachlan Feeney, CEO of Labrys, a blockchain consulting and development firm, who mentioned that many validators are re-staking Ether back onto the Beacon Chain in a conversation with Cointelegraph:
“Much of the stake that has been withdrawn over the last few days is actually going straight back into The Beacon Chain as validators are looking to compound their interest. So much so that net stake is currently increasing.”
Feeney stated that due to the current macroeconomic climate, several early stakers wished to liquidate after waiting for almost 30 months.
Feeney is of the opinion that the Shapella hard fork will only lead to a rise in the amount of Ether staked in the mid to long term, which will ultimately bolster Ethereum’s consensus level:
“Because Shapella is a massive de-risking event, over the medium to long-term more, not less, ETH will be staked. We anticipate that in the not too distant future, we will reach a record high of Ether being staked.”
According to Markus Thielen, who is the head of research at digital asset platform Matrixport, the discontinuation of crypto exchange Kraken’s staking services could be one of the reasons behind the increased figures:
“It appears largely due to the Kraken’s staking business being unwound. This will only have a temporary effect as we are also seeing a significant demand from investors who now are able to stake with more visibility on the liquidity of staked positions.”
Thielen expects a significant amount of un-staked Ether from Kraken to be re-invested in the Beacon Chain through other entities.
Although Thielen anticipates the positive price trend to subside this week due to increased selling pressure, he believes that Shapella will ultimately attract more institutional investors to stake on Ethereum.
The 1 million milestone is a 500% increase from Glassnode’s prediction made on April 11, which estimated only 170,000 Ether would be un-staked after the first week of Shapella.
Nansen, an on-chain analytics firm, slightly overestimated the withdrawal of Ether, predicting that 1.4 million Ether would be withdrawn after the first few days of Shapella.