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Arrangement about the Ethereum Merge Plan and Potential Fork

2022-09-05 07:390139

Dear Global Bitgetters,

According to the Mainnet Merge Announcement issued by the Ethereum Foundation and information from The Merge, the ETH will shift from Proof-of-Work (PoW) mechanism to the Proof-of-Stake (PoS) mechanism after reaching a specific total difficulty value. Specifically speaking, the PoW-based Ethereum chain will migrate to PoS chain when it reaches a Terminal Total Difficulty (TTD) value of 587500000000000000000000000. The timeline is expected to be between September 10, 2022 and September 20, 2022. The current estimation is that the transition may take place at approximately 2022-09-15 00:30 (UTC). when the block height of the Ethereum Mainnet reaches 15,540,293.

The Merge is a two-step process. The first step is a network upgrade, Bellatrix, on the consensus layer triggered by an epoch height. This is followed by the execution layer's transition from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake, Paris, triggered by a specific Total Difficulty threshold called TTD.

In the process of ETH merge and upgrade, new fork tokens may be created. In order to maintain the safety of users’ assets and provide a better trading experience, Bitget will take the following measures.

I. About ETH Deposit and Withdrawal:

Bitget will suspend the deposit and withdraw of ETH and ERC-20 network tokens at

  • 11:00 AM on September 6, 2022 for consensus layer upgrade (Bellatrix)
  • 00:00 AM on September 15, 2022 for executive level upgrade (Paris)

The specific timing of suspension resumption of deposit and withdrawal will be notified separately in the form of an announcement.

II. About the Merge

The following two scenarios may occur with this Ethereum merge.

Scenario 1.

If no new tokens are generated after the hard fork, Bitget will resume depositing and withdrawals as soon as possible after confirming that there is no security risk, and will notify the official community and post announcements at that time.

Scenario 2.

The “ETH” code will be used in the Ethereum PoS chain if a fork chain and new fork tokens are created during the Ethereum merge and upgrade.

Bitget will also distribute forked tokens to users at a 1:1 ratio from chains with less work completed based on a snapshot of ETH holdings prior to the execution layer upgrade (expected at an Ethereum Mainnet block height of 15,540,293), and will support withdrawal operations for forked tokens.

Bitget will decide whether to list the fork tokens after taking into full account of our users’ opinions and assessing its compliance with security standards. More details will be revealed in a separate announcement.

III. About the spot trading of ETH and ERC-20 network tokens

Spot Trading: Spot trading of ETH and ERC-20 network tokens will not be affected, but a hard fork may be accompanied by more drastic price fluctuations, so please assess the risk before trading.

IV. About ETH FuturesTrading

USDT-margined and coin-margined futures trading of ETH will not be affected. However, a hard fork may be accompanied by more drastic price fluctuations, so please assess the risk before trading. If there are any changes to the underlying assets of the futures contract, Bitget will provide more details or updates in further announcements.

V. About Flexible Savings

The subscriptions and redemptions of ETH Flexible Savings are not affected during the merge. The new tokens generated in the hard fork from the ETH balance in the Savings account will be distributed to the main account.

Please note:

  • If at the time of snapshot, the ETH sell order has been filled, the deposit has not yet arrived or the withdrawal has been completed, the assets will not be counted in the position snapshot statistics. Please process the transaction, deposit and withdrawal in time. Bitget will assist you to deal with any technical issues in the hard fork.
  • We will notify the official community and make announcements when the deposit and withdrawal operations resume.
  • Each block has different difficulty increments, making it harder to predict the TTD time window than the block or time slot height, and therefore the expected range can be wider. Users should note that the exact timing of the Mainnet transition is also difficult to predict, as the hash rate of the workload proof changes from time to time.

For more information, please visit:

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and thank you for your understanding. We will continue to provide you with better products and services!

Bitget Team

September 5, 2022