Ethereum’s Shanghai upgrade, the next major upgrade post Merge, is slated for the second half of 2023. The upgrade would be a key milestone as it would allow holders who have staked their Ether (ETH) for years to withdraw them systematically and make the network more scalable. Apart from some of the major scalability upgrades, the key event would also tuck in a few minor Ethereum improvement proposals (EIPs), including EIP-3651, EIP-3855 and EIP-3860. Among all the upcoming improvement proposals, EIP-3651, called WARM Coinbase, could be a game changer that could reduce network fees for some of the key network …

China's biggest city Shanghai officially intends to boost the development of innovations such as blockchain, nonfungible tokens (NFTs), the Metaverse and Web3 during its next five-year plan. On July 13, Shanghai's Municipal Government published a draft of its "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of Shanghai's Digital Economy." The document sets its mission of "promoting the deep integration of digital technology and the real economy," with "scientists judging technology prospects" and "entrepreneurs discovering market demand." The plan suggests supporting the enterprises that plan to construct the NFT trading platforms and "research and promote the digitization of NFT and other assets." …

The popularity of nonfungible tokens (NFTs) is on the rise as recent data shows that the number of digital collectible platforms in China has grown to over 500, a 5X increase from February 2022, when the total number of NFT platforms was just over 100. According to a report published by a local Chinese daily, the sharp rise in the number of NFT platforms comes amid the growing hype and popularity of the digital collectibles in the country. Major tech giants including Tencent and Alibaba have shown interest in the nascent space and have filed multiple trademark patents. The rise …

The city of Shanghai has been in a month-long mandated quarantine, which confines its 25 million residents to their homes. Initially, the latest COVID-19 outbreak began in March of this year and developed into the worst infection zone since the beginning of the pandemic. As the virus infected hundreds of thousands of people, the extremely lockdown prevented residents from leaving their homes for weeks on end. In addition to the spike in infections, the lockdown prevented people from obtaining food and medical treatment, and introduced other austerities. This led to frustrated citizens taking to the internet for solidarity and venting. …

Shanghai, China's most crowded city, is looking for ways to use metaverse in public services over the next five years. Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Information Technology's five-year development plan for the electronic information industry listed four frontiers for exploration, and one of them is metaverse. According to a CNBC report, the paper called for promoting the metaverse's use in public services, business offices, social leisure, industrial manufacturing, production safety, and electronic games. The commission plans to encourage further study and development of underlying technologies, such as sensors, real-time interactions and blockchain technology. China's interest in new technology has …

As financial authorities around the globe become increasingly concerned about stablecoin regulation, a jurisdiction in China is preparing to pilot a new yuan-pegged stablecoin for international trade. Chris Banbury, head of global operations at permissionless blockchain project Conflux, told Cointelegraph on Sept. 21 that the firm will provide its technology to launch an offshore renminbi (RMB) stablecoin pegged to China’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), the digital yuan. “This is going to be pegged to the digital yuan in price only with no formal integration,” Banbury noted, adding that the project will be exploring how the token trades against other …

Ethereum (ETH) has enjoyed a good run so far in 2021, with its value increasing from about $1,300 at the beginning of the year, to nearly $4,000 in May. However, Ethereum’s price aside, consistent problems on the Ethereum blockchain have brought to light the anger of traders and decentralized application (DApp) developers on the Ethereum ecosystem. Lack of scalability and high gas fees are the main issues. As one of crypto’s biggest platforms for decentralized applications, Ethereum has been dealing with network congestion that reflects the high gas fees that people have had to pay with every transaction. Since the …

Shanghai’s New World City and New World Daimaru Department Store, and food caterer Taikang Food Store handled thousands of digital yuan transactions over the past weekend, Shanghai Daily reports. As part of the trial, the retailers featured digital yuan payments as part of a sales campaign in conjunction with International Women’s Day. Brand director of Shanghai New World Li Wei said that the firm reached out to commercial banks to offer discounts as part of the campaign. “We have worked to upgrade the digital payment module ahead of the trial program, and we believe it offered extra stimulus for shoppers …

The world’s fourth-largest stock exchange released plans to use so-called distributed ledger technology (DLT) in securities transactions July 10. The Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE), which as of December 2017 had a market cap in excess of $5 tln, said in a report that “most people” consider that blockchain technology can “help improve the transparency of the securities industry.” “Part of the market is now starting to adopt this technology in part, and larger-scale industry applications will do so after a few years,” the institution wrote in introductory remarks. While China’s ban on cryptocurrency innovations such as Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) …

VeChain, a Shanghai-based blockchain startup, is testing a blockchain application to verify of the wine supply chain and fight counterfeits, South China Morning Post reported May 24. The Chinese wine industry is worth $2.8 bln, but according to the South China Morning Post, aphorisms such as “the Chinese gulp down more ‘French’ wines than France makes” and “at least half of the Chateau Lafite-Rothschild consumed in China is fake,” have weakened public trust in the quality of the product. As part of the initiative, VeChain is working with retailer Shanghai Waigaoqiao Direct Imported Goods (DIG) and testing the products of …