Exchanges Vow to Keep ETH Trading Open as Merge Moves Closer

cryptonews.com:

Crypto exchanges are vowing to keep trading open and unaffected during Ethereum’s (ETH) transition to proof-of-stake (PoS), despite deposits and withdrawals of ETH and ERC-20 tokens being halted. 

Meanwhile, the major exchange FTX has gone one step further, announcing a halt to wrapped ETH transactions on other chains as well.

For FTX’s part, ETH and ERC-20 deposits and withdrawals will be suspended from September 6 at 11:34 UTC, approximately 30 minutes before the Bellatrix update – a key step that must be completed before the actual Merge, which marks the network’s transition to PoS. The exchange has not said how long the suspension will remain in place.

Notably, FTX on Monday also said that it will suspend deposits and withdrawals of various forms of wrapped ETH on other chains, including Arbitrum One ETH, Solana (Wormhole) ETH and Binance Smart Chain (BSC) ETH.

All trading in ETH on FTX will remain open during the Merge, FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried has confirmed.

Meanwhile, the US-based crypto exchange Kraken has said that while ETH trading will remain open, Ethereum deposits and withdrawals “may be unavailable for 12 hours or longer during the merge.”

The same was also reiterated by Kraken’s Head of OTC Trading, Juthica Chou, who said in a Bloomberg interview this weekend that there “might be a temporary suspension on withdrawals and deposits,” adding that “we won’t halt trading.”

Among other major exchanges, Coinbase said in August that it will “briefly pause new Ethereum (ETH) and ERC-20 token deposits and withdrawals as a precautionary measure,” but keep trading open.

Binance, on its end, has said ETH and ERC-20 deposits and withdrawals will be suspended on September 6 at 11:00 UTC for the Bellatrix upgrade, and again on