🚨BREAKING:

SHARPLINK GAMING TO RAISE $1 BILLION — ALL OF IT GOING TO BUY $ETH FOR ITS TREASURY! 🚨

This is MAJOR news for Ethereum. 🚀
A huge vote of confidence in #Ethereum’s future as a store of value AND a powerhouse for gaming & Web3.

Buckle up, ETH stans — this could be the boost we’ve been waiting for. 💎🙌

#ethereum #ETH #cryptonews #Web3 #Blockchain #defi #NFTGaming #SharplinkGaming

Optimistic Ethereum, now primarily referred to as Optimism or OP Mainnet, is a layer-2 scaling solution for Ethereum focused on improving transaction speed and reducing costs while maintaining security through optimistic rollups.

Here's the latest based on recent activity:

Superchain Expansion: Optimism is pushing its "Superchain" vision, a network of interoperable layer-2 blockchains built on the open-source OP Stack. Recent posts highlight integrations like Unichain, with incentives starting April 15, 2025, and Soneium's growth strengthening the ecosystem.

Retro Funding: Optimism continues its Retroactive Public Goods Funding (RetroPGF), rewarding developers and projects that contribute to Ethereum’s ecosystem. A recent call for applications for the next round closes April 27, 2025, emphasizing fair rewards based on impact, not marketing. Over 2 million OP tokens were allocated this month for dev tooling and onchain builders.

Performance and Governance: The OP token governs the Optimism Collective, a decentralized system driving ecosystem growth. As of early 2025, OP’s price is around $0.65-$0.69 USD, with a market cap of about $1.14 billion. Q4 2024 saw an 11.3% increase in total value locked (TVL) to $756.1 million, though price performance remained flat, causing a dip in market cap rank.

Open-Source Commitment: Optimism is doubling down on open-sourcing its tech, with 131 GitHub repositories and contributions like the OP Stack powering chains like OP Mainnet and Base. This aligns with their mission to scale Ethereum collaboratively.

https://x.com/optimism
https:

Ethereum Developers Introduce Hoodi Testnet for Upcoming Pectra Upgrade

Ethereum developers have launched a new test network named Hoodi, which will facilitate the blockchain's forthcoming 'Pectra' upgrade. Scheduled to go live on Hoodi on March 26, the upgrade is expected to transition to Ethereum's mainnet approximately 30 days later, contingent on successful testing outcomes.

The creation of Hoodi follows unsuccessful Pectra tests on Ethereum’s other testnets, Holesky and Sepolia, which encountered configuration issues preventing proper finalization. These test networks, including Hoodi, are designed to replicate the main Ethereum network, providing developers a low-risk environment to trial code changes or significant upgrades like Pectra before mainnet deployment.

Initially, the Pectra upgrade was intended to activate on Ethereum after the tests on Holesky and Sepolia. However, due to complications, developers opted to establish Hoodi for another round of testing the ambitious Pectra upgrade. Hoodi is also anticipated to serve future testing needs.

Hoodi mirrors Ethereum’s mainnet by maintaining an equivalent number of validators on its network. Ethereum core developer Parithosh Jayanthi highlighted during a recent #ethereum core developers call that Hoodi would be instrumental for Ethereum staking pools and node operators to evaluate their infrastructure.