A community-driven validator collective called Lido has staked almost 4.65 million of the 16 million ETH that has been staked. According to crypto analyst Glassnode, the four biggest Ethereum validators Lido, Coinbase, Kraken, and Binance control 56% of all ETH staked.
https://twitter.com/glassnode/status/1617294398613749761
Since the Merge in September, when Ethereum abandoned its previous proof-of-work consensus process, the number of ETH staked has increased by around 16.68%. The Merge completely switched the Ethereum blockchain to a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism, which eschewed the current staking method in favor of the energy-intensive crypto-mining process used by proof-of-work.
ETH Staked Passes 16M
If Ethereum has not yet received a big upgrade, it will not be possible to withdraw the $22.38 billion worth of ETH that has been pledged.
A little over three and a half months after Ethereum completed the successful shift to a proof-of-stake network, the blockchain with the second-largest total number of nodes has reached another key milestone. According to recent data, a total of more than 16 million ether (ETH) have been deposited into the staking contract for the Beacon Chain on Ethereum.
At the current price, the value of 16 million ETH is equivalent to roughly $22.38 billion, and it represents more than 13.28% of the total supply of ether. It took place nearly to the day after the Ethereum proof-of-stake contract went live in 2020 and almost two years to the day after the Beacon Chain proof-of-stake network was established.
The “validators” of the Ethereum network “stake” ETH in return for the chance to add verified transactions to the distributed ledger maintained by the blockchain. The staked funds are unable to be withdrawn from the network until the Shanghai upgrade has been completed, which is not expected to happen until March at the earliest. Although the funds continue to generate interest while they are locked up in the network, they cannot be used until then.
There might be a catch
Although an increase in the quantity of ETH that has been staked might be considered a development that is beneficial for Ethereum adoption and security, it may place greater pressure on the network’s core developers to finish the withdrawal feature as quickly as feasible.
Approximately 92,500 unique depositors are participating in the staking process at this time. There are around 498,000 active validators. A greater quantity of ETH staked makes it theoretically more difficult for a single person to disrupt the Ethereum chain. In practice, however, the opposite is true. But at the moment, a very small number of prominent individuals possess the bulk of Ethereum’s stake, which has raised concerns that the chain’s administration is becoming too centralized.
