The number of ether locked in the Ethereum 2.0 contract has exceeded 9 million ethereum or more than $28 billion using today’s exchange rates. The amount of ethereum locked into the contract has increased 22.29% since the first week of September 2021, when the contract held 7.4 million ether.

Ethereum 2.0 Contract Exceeds 9 Million Ether

While the proof-of-work (PoW) side of the Ethereum network has seen its hashrate tap all-time highs above 1 petahash per second (PH/s) this year, the transition to Ethereum 2.0 continues with ether being locked into the ETH 2.0 contract.

Essentially, to become a validator and stake ethereum, 32 ETH is required to join the pool of ETH 2.0 validators. When the ETH 2.0 contract first launched, Bitcoin.com News reported on Ethereum’s co-founder Vitalik Buterin contributing funds to the contract on November 6, 2020.

On January 17, 2022, etherscan.io data indicates that there’s approximately 9,057,890 ethereum worth over $28 billion (at the time of writing) in the ETH 2.0 contract. Data shows that the contract exceeded 9 million ether on January 16, 2022.

Year-to-date, ethereum’s price is up over 150% but during the last 30 days, ether has shed 18.5% and two-week stats indicate ether has lost 17.5% in value against the U.S. dollar. While Ethereum’s market cap dominance was 18-20% during the course of 2021, today ETH dominance is around 17.9%.

When Bitcoin.com News reported on the contract exceeding 7.4 million, ether was a bit more valuable as the stash was valued at $29.3 billion at the time. In addition to the 9 million ether locked into the ETH 2.0 contract, since the implementation of EIP-1559, 1,541,113 ethereum worth $5.8 billion (at the time of writing) has been burned.

Between the ETH 2.0 contract and the burned ethereum since the introduction of EIP-1559, the value equates to $33.8 billion in value at the time of writing.