Bitcoin Forum

Ethereum recently (actually today, Sept 15) upgraded its network from a Proof of Work (PoW) mechanism to that of Proof of Stake (PoS) with promised improvements for the ecosystem.

Here's my curated list of the top gainers from the Merge.

1. The environment - The 'new and improved' Ethereum should consume 99.9% less energy than the previous system.

2. Network - The Merge guarantees more security, scalability and sustainability.

3. Validators (Stakers) - ETH owners will be able to stake their coins while earning more.

4. ETH Holders - Though there isn't any significant increase in ETH trading price, however, successful completion of Ethereum Merge is a stepping stone towards other planned upgrades. These upgrades may lead to increase in ETH price in the near future.

The biggest ganers are "Buy the Rumor, Sell the facts" traders because ETH gived them book-like trade with +90% pre event pump, book-like high 3 days before event and crash just after event.


Lesser decentralization. Thats what we have now. More scalability and sustanability will be introduced in next updates (sharding) if ETH will deliver it.


There is not significant increase because we are in "sell the facts" stage which will dominate next days/weeks as long as whole market wont go up like crazy. Increased value (if it was in fact increased) will work in long term (months/years).

The biggest gainer imo is everyone who supports this network and wants to see it better and more user-friendly. In addition to the above mentioned, i sincerely hope this merge will somehow reduce the transaction fee to the lowest level as we have in other networks.

Well, the real gainers aside from #1 to #2 are the whales. The scheme of PoS is really for them, the rich folks and they'll be richer than ever because of it.

But, it's not going to be as easy as it is but adding to be patient is what they must have as a quality but I'm sure that they'll be like that as they know what's ETH is all about these days.

You are right the whales are the biggest gainers as the power to control the network have been handed over to the ethereum holder who stakes the balance of the pool to process transaction, there is one strong limitation to the proof of stake consensus which is the ability of the highest ethereum holders to control the process of transaction processing in the network. There is a fact that proof of stake will less the energy consumption by the ethereum holders and aside from this I don't see much advantage the merge has over proof of work and if we must view it closely the proof of stake favors the big bag holder who can afford to lock their funds in the staking pool for a long time and giving them the power to control the network.

Since when the whales are not in control over anything in this world?
It is a common fact, not just in crypto but in real life they are the ones who is manipulating the flow of the market, politics, etc.
PoW consumes a lot of resources, we might not see it from our perspective but it is real and unsustainable in the long run. PoS is healthier compared to PoW in this case, so we can not conclude anything yet at least for now. There is pro and con, but I believe it is an upgrade instead of a downgrade.
They won't postpone it for years if they do not have a proper reason to do it.

Pretty much most of the reply here (together with mine) believes that the biggest gainer of the concluded Ethereum Merge is whales that have lots of ETH on their stash.  It is funny how OP stated that the current network is now more decentralized when we have known the fact the POS is more inclined to centralization than decentralization.  Scalability << a big lol, @op had you really read about the "what is" of this merge?  Sharding is the one that will make ETH more scalable and it is planned to be implemented in 2023, that is if there is no delay.

For the price action, it appears the Merge has already been factored into ETH. Probably why there's no significant increase in ETH price. Instead what we're experiencing at the moment is falling prices across the market.

Yeah, I believed that the hype on the merge have been price in, when the price of ETH almost reach $2k, around $1,900 and then there are speculators who spread the news that it might hit $2100-$2200 on the actual merge but it didn't happen because of the CPI.

In the long run the biggest gainers will be the one who are going to used the used the Network. If the number of users and investors are going to grow in the next couple of years, then this merge could be consider as a success. And as others said, the whales and manipulators, Lol, since they are going to stake that much ETH, they will have the control of the network.

This has been discussed already, the merge can’t solve the higher fees because this update is for the mining so it will become more friendly and less in energy consumption. Maybe on their next update ETH will address that issue but I think this is not their focus yet. The biggest gainers are those who are able to take profit, holding is not good especially if you bought at the top and currently trap on its current price. Let’s hope that ETH merge will bring more good updates in the platform, this is just the beginning for sure.

It's really favoring those whales that has the most holdings and they're taking care of the network. While the little players, yeah, we also are part of it but we can't do much with it.

They're the ones that will bag more profits as they've invested more and held more Ethereum before the merge. Right now, I just hope that the network is still secured and there won't be flaws caught out with this transition.

How I wish that I was one of the people who holds a lot of ETH.

You forgot the biggest winner which is bitcoin, the biggest competitor bitcoin had was ethereum, but now the ethereum developers decided to actually go through the merge and become a POS coin, so bitcoin has basically no competitors now.

Now this does not mean that I think the price of ethereum will collapse overnight or anything like that, however this change gives too much power to the ethereum whales to do whatever they want, and it's a mistake to think they will take any action which will go against their own interests, as in many occasions those interests will run contrary to the interests of the average ethereum user.

How about those who sell before the Ethereum Merge? They are also a part of those winners today.
All they need to do is buy back now or if in luck, tomorrow if one more dump will happen and they will have 10 percent more Ethereum in their wallets. But it requires a mountain of courage before doing it.
Those who are used to doing this kind of method are now reaping the rewards.
They will be able to stake more and gain profits in a passive way because of that decision they made.

So far there have been no obvious advantages. it seems that this ethereum merge will have an effect on ethereum in the long run because it is only 2 days after the successful merge. The thing that worries me about the merger is that there will be massive sales, but that doesn't happen but the benefits are not yet clear. i just want ethereum to be much cheaper than gas before.

A merge doesnt mean a guaranteed increase of price. Yet what happened is the total opposite. Though the event is really a great advance for ethereum as it being improved on PoS. Theres a lot of miners who are probably clueless what to do on either staked their stash or sold eth and focus on another coin to mine to avoid the lack of use of their mining equipments.

In my own personal point of view, there is still no clear big or even winners or gainers coming from the Ethereum merge event...as we are witnessing that there is no significant rise in the price of the coin which is what many can be expecting. This is already priced into Ethereum the past many days so for now there is nothing we can expect more...let's see the coming developments in Ethereum if they can be triggering a big movement towards at least $2000. I bought some Eth when the price was at $2900 so it kinda make me sad that up to now my money is still trapped somewhere.