Is Grayscale preparing to stake its ETH holdings?

Movements of ETH from Grayscale’s wallets suggest the large-scale holder may be preparing to stake the tokens. Grayscale may create a precedent of using its significant ETH holdings to receive rewards. 

Grayscale may be looking at millions in passive income if it stakes its ETH holdings. On-chain analysts have noticed movements from some of Grayscale’s wallets, suggesting the company may finally become a staker, after years of passively holding ETH. 

Public wallets began moving funds

Grayscale’s public wallets started moving tranches of exactly 3.2K ETH to new unidentified wallets. The company moved 40K ETH in an hour, with the potential to stake 1.5M ETH. 

Until recently, Grayscale was among the biggest holders, mostly due to its ETHE ETP, which was later transformed into a full ETF. At one point, Grayscale also acquired a vast reserve of ETH at extremely low prices, even buying at $90. Afterward, Grayscale sold a significant part of its holdings, still retaining 1.51M ETH. Over time, the new ETF balances flowed into Grayscale’s wallets, as investors flocked to ETH. 

Grayscale may expect rewards of 45K to 60K ETH per year, while potentially learning to use liquid staking tokens. Grayscale alone will add 45,785 validators if all of its ETH reserves are staked. The fund may be the first to build a staking ETF, following BlackRock’s pressure to create this type of investment vehicle. 

The coin movements happened after Grayscale’s Digital Large Cap ETP received permission to trade as an ETF, as Cryptopolitan reported earlier. 

ETH breaks above $4,600

Following the news of the eventual Grayscale stake, ETH continued its recovery, breaking to $4,632.07. ETH is still trading with expectations for a breakout to a higher range, based on demand from treasury companies and ETFs. 

ETH open interest remained above $27B, with a slight increase in short positions. ETH also faces significant liquidity in the $4,440 range, which may be attacked and lead to a short-term dip. 

ETH staking queue shows another exit wave

The ETH validator queue showed increased activity in the past week. In the past days, the queue expanded, with 2,484,285 ETH waiting to be unstaked. Another 462,882 ETH are waiting to enter the Beacon Chain contract. 

Currently, 350,715,709 ETH is staked, an all-time peak, spread over 1,049,460 validators. The number of validators has been falling gradually since July. 

The ETH network is more active, though it remains inflationary. The token supply has increased to 121,067,568 ETH after a low of around 120M during the Ethereum deflationary phase. Increased demand for DeFi once again raised fees to $3-$5 for the most common swaps and on-chain operations.