Ethereum has experienced a dramatic surge in value, surpassing even established giants like Coca-Cola and Alibaba. The price hike is largely attributed to the successful deployment of Ethereum’s Pectra upgrade, which significantly improves functionality and scalability for the blockchain network. This new milestone positions Ethereum as one of the world’s top 40 largest assets by market capitalization. The upgrade was first announced in March 2025 but faced delays due to technical hurdles during testing. After facing setbacks on the Holesky testnet, Pectra was eventually deployed to the Sepolia testnet and finally to the main Ethereum network on May 7th. The update introduced several key changes: – EOAs can now function as smart contracts for gas fee payments using various tokens. – Validator staking limits were increased from 32 ETH to 2,048 ETH. This simplifies operations for large stakers and enhances the overall network efficiency. – The upgrade also increases data blobs per block, facilitating greater scalability for layer-2 networks. The Pectra upgrade has led to a significant price surge for Ethereum, with its value reaching as high as $2,550 on May 12th, marking a 42% increase in just five days. However, security experts have raised concerns about the new upgrade’s potential vulnerabilities. They highlight a possibility of attackers exploiting a newly introduced transaction type to potentially gain control of user-owned accounts without signing on-chain transactions. These security risks are being actively investigated and monitored by cybersecurity professionals.