The recent upgrade to the Ethereum ecosystem has resulted in record-high staking returns for investors. The annualized rate of return for running an ETH validator currently stands at 8.76%, the highest since the implementation of unstaking.

Investors have deposited 3.44 million ETH into ETH 2.0 contracts and withdrawn 2.67 million ETH, resulting in a net pledge of 770.70k ETH. The upgrade, known as 'Shapella,' has also promised to bring about positive changes such as dropping gas fees for developers and making the platform more scalable and efficient.