- EigenLayer’s TVL jumped 88% in the last two days.
- EigenLayer’s temporary removal of deposit caps caused the spike in TVL.
Ethereum [ETH] restaking protocol EigenLayer became the sixth-largest DeFi protocol after its deposits surged exponentially in the last two days.
EigenLayer races ahead
According to AMBCrypto’s analysis of DeFiLlama data, EigenLayer’s total value locked (TVL) stormed past $4 billion at press time, marking an 88% increase from its tally on the 5th of February.
The impressive surge was the latest in the protocol’s upward trajectory, which has seen its TVL grow by an astounding 1500% since mid-December.
Source: DeFiLlama
EigenLayer eases deposit rules
The jump in deposits came as EigenLayer temporarily removed deposit caps for all tokens until the 9th of February. It said that the caps would be eventually “lifted permanently in the coming months.”
For the uninitiated, EigenLayer places caps on the deposits to maintain decentralization and prevent dominance of any single liquid staking protocol.
However, to strike a balance between decentralization and neutrality, the project went ahead and liberalized the existing framework.
Restaking: the future?
One of the hottest new DeFi narratives, restaking allows ETH stakers to participate in validating new software modules developed on top of the Ethereum ecosystem.
Put simply, the same ETH staked on the Ethereum network can be repurposed to extend security to other applications, in the process allowing stakers to earn extra rewards.
It was this very prospect of higher interest on their staked ETH that was drawing users in hordes towards EigenLayer.
EigenLayer supports several liquid staking derivatives (LSDs) including those from Lido, Rocket Pool, and Coinbase.
Lido Staked Ether accounted for 33% of the total deposits as of this writing, while WETH made up 31% of the total TVL.
On a broader level, EigenLayer along with other liquid restaking protocols commanded a TVL of over $6 billion as of this writing.
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Ether.fi, a popular restaking protocol, introduced a new dimension wherein the deposited ETH would be automatically restaked on EigenLayer.
This was different from a traditional restaked ETH where a user deposits already staked ETH onto EigenLayer.
