Ethereum Community Makes Inside Joke about '$WETH Depegged'

Recently, there have been rumors on Twitter about "$WETH being depegged" and "Wrapped Ethereum Foundation being insolvent". Bloomberg also reported the FUD around $WETH in an article. However, the "$WETH depegged" thing is just an inside joke in the Ethereum community.

According to TokenInsight data, $WETH is trading at $1,172.97, while $ETH is trading at $1,173.20, with no signs of depegging. Curve Finance also clarified on Twitter, saying, "$WETH stuff is a joke which all Ethereans are having fun with, trolling anyone who believes it."

Hudson Jameson, former member of Ethereum Foundation, explained the joke on Twitter. He said, "WETH is a smart contract that accepts ether and gives you back an ERC-20 token called '$WETH'. Because the ether token does not have the same properties as an ERC-20 token, 'wrapping' it in a contract is necessary. That being said, when you 'wrap' ether, the $WETH you receive back is equal to the $ETH you put in, so $WETH doesn't deviate from the price of $ETH."

"Additionally, the $WETH supply is not stored by a centralized exchange or group, so the primary concern would be the safety of the WETH contract. It is open source and many experts have looked at it to check for bugs, so it is generally considered safe to use." He added. "The $WETH jokes today play on the fact that $WETH is an ERC-20 token that is impossible to go insolvent (besides an unlikely contract flaw) and will always be backed 1-to-1 by the ether deposited by you."