GuShiio.com Can Ethereum defend ecological hegemony? How does Solana rewrite performance rules? t Let’s watch the upgrade logic and ecological competition between ETH and SOL.
At about 8 a.m. on March 7, David Sacks, White House Director of AI and Cryptocurrency, posted on social media that President Trump signed an executive order to establish a strategic bitcoin reserve a few minutes ago. However, after this huge good news came out, the market did not seem to buy it and directly retreated 5.6%. This seems to have become daily in recent times, and it will fall every time it goes good. eth and sol, which may have been used as reserves, were not spared. But there seems to be a more important topic for eth and sol, which is the major upgrade they are facing: Ethereum s Pectra vs. Solana s SIMD-0228.
Quick overview of upgrades
Ethereum’s Pectra upgrade and Solana’s SIMD-0228 proposal are two important events in the blockchain field in 2025, representing different paths for technology optimization and economic model adjustment respectively.
Ethereum Pectra upgrade
The Pectra upgrade is planned to be implemented in March or April 2025 and combines Prague and Electra phases to improve network performance and user experience. Research shows that it includes account abstraction (allowing gas fees to be paid with tokens such as USDC and DAI), pledge optimization (increasing the maximum pledge of verifiers from 32 ETH to 2048 ETH), and smart contract optimization. Current data shows that approximately 33.8 million ETH have been pledged, accounting for approximately 28% of the total, and the reward rate is approximately 3.81%(Datawallet)。This may attract more users, but centralization risks (such as large households controlling more nodes) are worth paying attention to.
The Ethereum Pectra upgrade was originally planned to be completed in one go, but the development team found it too complex and risky to implement all functions at the same time. Therefore, they decided to divide the upgrade into two phases.
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Phase 1 (early 2025): Focus on direct improvements related to account abstraction and validators. These improvements will make Ethereum more user-friendly while improving pledge rewards.
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Phase 2 (expected to be 2026): Introduce more technical optimizations, such as the EVM Object Format (EOF) to improve the efficiency of smart contracts, and PeerDAS technology to further enhance Layer 2 scalability.
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Pertra: The upgrade mainly includes the following aspects:
1. Account abstraction
2. Smart contract efficiency
3. Optimization for verifiers
4. Optimize data management with Verkle trees
5. Layer 2 solutions and PeerDAS
Solana SIMD-0228 Proposal
Proposal 0228 dynamically adjusts the inflation rate based on the pledge rate, with the goal of maintaining a 50% pledge rate and reducing the additional issuance rate of SOL in the long run. Solana’s current inflation model is a gradually declining curve over time. An inflation rate of 8% was set when the main network was launched (March 2019) and dropped over time. The current inflation rate is about 4.8%, and the long-term target inflation rate is 1.5%-2%. If this proposal is passed, short-term pledge gains will be reduced (based on the pledge rate ranging from 1% to 4.5%), and the long-term inflation rate will approach 1.5%. The current pledge rate is 70%, so if 228 is passed, the pledge SOL income will decrease in the short term, additional issuance will decrease in the long run, and the pledge yield will be adjusted in real time based on the pledge rate. It is worth mentioning that additional SOL is regarded as ordinary income and is subject to tax at least in the United States. Therefore, there will be selling pressure proportional to the amount of additional issuance.
Solana’s proposal SIMD-0228 will begin voting on March 6, 2025, with the goal of reducing SOL inflation from 4.5% to 0.87% through a dynamic emissions mechanism. It adjusts emissions based on the pledge participation rate: issuance is reduced when the pledge rate is above 50%, and increased when it is below 50%. Currently, the Solana pledge rate is about 63.43%, about 322.3 million SOL is pledged, and the inflation rate is about 4.5%. This may stabilize the value of SOL, but dynamic mechanisms may affect market confidence.
Pectra is more comprehensive and covers technical aspects;SIMD-0228 focuses on economic adjustments. Pectra may improve efficiency, but centralization is controversial;SIMD-0228 may attract investors, but emissions uncertainty needs to be observed. In the future, on-chain data (such as changes in pledge rates) will reveal its actual impact.
prospect
The Ethereum Pectra upgrade and the Solana SIMD-0228 proposal represent different paths for the development of the public chain:
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PectraConsolidate Ethereum’s ecological advantages through comprehensive technical improvements and is suitable for investors and developers who focus on long-term technology and user experience. The community’s response seemed to be cold. As of March 7, the writing date, Ethereum Pectra test went wrong again, and empty block problems began to appear. Some developers called for the main network to be upgraded or postponed in April, and the ETH market sentiment hit the bottom.
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In contrast, SIMD-0228To enhance the value appeal of SOL through economic model optimization, this proposal is intended to adjust the additional issuance rate of SOL. The proposal at this time point is essentially based on the general context: -The Solana ecosystem will prosper in 2024, but trading activity will gradually decline from All Time High;SOL will become a compliant asset and shift to ETFs and institutional assets. SOL will increase short-term selling pressure and reduce long-term selling pressure, which can release liquidity or bring about a short-term wave of market conditions on the SOL chain.
The success of both depends on implementation effectiveness and market acceptance. Pectra’s concentration risk and the market confidence impact of SIMD-0228 will be the focus of future observations, and on-chain data (such as changes in pledge rates and inflation rates) will become key indicators to assess their impact. We will wait and see in the next two months
