The FTX crypto exchange will briefly pause all deposits and withdrawals of ETH and ERC-20 tokens as Etheruem prepares to transition to its eco-friendly upgrade called Blockchain Merge. The final Bellatrix update will begin on Tuesday, September 6th to complete this transition. If all goes well, the merger is expected around September 15. To ensure that no transactions are lost or affected during this transition, FTX will halt all deposits and withdrawals on Solana, Arbitrum as well as other blockchains for at least 30 minutes.
“FTX Bellatrix will suspend ETH and ERC-20 token deposits and withdrawals approximately half an hour prior to the consensus layer upgrade. It is your responsibility to understand the implications of the merger. FTX is not responsible for any loss incurred,” the company said in it Blog post,
The Bahamas-based crypto exchange, which claimed to have over one million users as of February this year, also posted an update on Twitter.
The decision from FTX comes days after a DappRadar report warned that stablecoins and transactions supported on the Ethereum blockchain could experience some hiccups as the blockchain shifts from its energy-intensive proof-of-work (PoW) mining model to an energy-efficient one. Proof-of-Stake (PoS) mining model.
As the PoW mining model is notorious for consuming large amounts of energy, PoS-supporting blockchains are referred to as energy efficient.
Once the Ethereum blockchain switches to its merged version, its power consumption will decrease by 99.95 percent.
With the merge release approaching, OpenSea NFT Marketplace recently stated that it will fully support the upgraded version of the blockchain.
Earlier this month, stablecoin major Tether and Circle Pay, the USD coin issuer, also extended support for the merger.
Circle Pay said that once the merger is done, it will only use that version of Ethereum for USD coin operations, while Tether has decided to start supporting it in line with its release schedule for the merger.
