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GM. This is Milk Road. We make crypto news easy to read and hard to put down.

Here’s what we got for you today:

• Ethereum’s big upgrade is tomorrow! 👀

• BTC just passed silver 🍪

ETHEREUM’S BIG UPGRADE IS TOMORROW! 👀

We’re T-24 hours away from Ethereum’s next big upgrade…. Dencun. 

You might have questions. You might be scared. You might’ve just peed yourself.

Don’t worry though. Repeat after me… “Milk Road always has my back.” 

We don’t want you to look as lost as Will Ferrell when he finally got back to civilization in Elf.

So today we’re gonna cover everything you need to know. Let’s dive in. 

1/ First of all… What’s up with the name? Why ‘Dencun’?

I know. It sounds like a 3-year-old trying to say “Dunkin’ Donuts” for the first time. 

But it’s actually a mix between two upgrades happening simultaneously…

• Deneb: The upgrade on Ethereum’s consensus layer. 

• Cancun: The upgrade on Ethereum’s execution layer. 

Deneb + Cancun = Dencun. 

P.S. - If you get confused between the two names, just remember… Potato. Potahto. It’s the same thing! 

2/ OK, so what is it? What’s it supposed to do?

Dencun is the first major Ethereum upgrade since The Merge. 

The goal is to improve the blockchain's scalability, efficiency, and security. 

3/ How? 

Through something called Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs). Think of them as small tweaks to the network. 

In total, 9 different EIPs will go into effect during the Dencun upgrade. 

The most important one is EIP-4844:

• It introduces something called “proto-danksharding.”

• This allows Ethereum Layer 2 networks (L2s) to use a new transaction type called “blobs” - which temporarily store large amounts of data more cost-effectively. 

• The upgrade will significantly reduce transaction fees on L2s - like Optimism, Arbitrum, Polygon, Base, etc. 

For all my visual people out there, here’s a quick “Before vs. After”:

P.S. - We won’t bore you with the details of the other 8 EIPs (EIP-4844 is the big one you need to know about).

But if you want to nerd out some more, check out this blog. 

If you want a dumbed-down version, check out this great Twitter thread. 

4/ So what? What’s the big deal?

• For users: It significantly reduces the fees to use Ethereum L2s. 

• For crypto projects: It makes Ethereum more attractive to build on. 

It can all be boiled down to this… less fees paid = more money to be made.

5/ What’s next?

If you’re an Ethereum user or ETH investor… you don’t need to do anything! 

Just sit back, relax, and wait for the magic to happen. 

WARNING: Beware of Stranger Danger. 

If someone messages you saying you need to do something (i.e. bridge your ETH, download a file, etc.)… it’s likely a scam! Run!

BITE-SIZED COOKIES FOR THE ROAD 🍪

Properly filing crypto taxes can be a daunting task. Thankfully, various platforms have emerged to ease the pain of tax season and make filing your crypto taxes as easy as filing regular taxes. Check out Milk Road’s Tax Software guide here.

BTC surpassed silver to become the 8th largest asset by market cap. In the words of the great Ludacris… “Move b*tch, get out the way.” 

The London Stock Exchange will start accepting applications for BTC and ETH crypto exchange-traded notes (ETNs) soon. Similar to crypto ETFs in the US, ETNs let investors trade securities that track their underlying crypto assets on the London Stock Exchange. 

MicroStrategy bought another 12,000 BTC, worth ~$821M. The Bitcoin-loving software company now owns 205,000 BTC, worth ~$15B (!!)

Solana just registered an all-time high for daily new addresses. According to data from The Block, 691K new addresses have been created over the last week. 

Bitcoin miners now hold 1.82M BTC (worth $131B) in their treasuries. It’s the highest U.S. dollar value on record. 

The GameFi market has outperformed the rest of the crypto market over the last 24 hours. The total value of tokens associated with web3 gaming now stands at $32.7B.

$104M has been lost to crypto phishing attacks this year. This includes $57.7M lost in January and $46.8M lost in February. Ouch.

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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.