Analysis of the Differences in Staking Business Models Between Ethereum and Solana

After obtaining funding from Polychain and Binance Labs in two rounds, the restaking project Solayer on the Solana chain has become a highlight in the DeFi field, with its TVL continuously rising, surpassing Orca and ranking twelfth on the Solana chain.

The staking track is an important sub-track of native cryptocurrency and also the track with the largest TVL, but its representative tokens LDO, EIGEN, ETHFI, etc. are struggling in performance. This article will explore:

• The competitiveness of staking and restaking protocols in the staking ecosystem
• The difference between Solayer and Eigenlayer's restaking
• The prospects of Solayer restaking business

Ethereum Network Stake Ecosystem Analysis

Lido's business logic and revenue composition

Lido solves the high staking threshold issue of ETH through the LST concept. Its income mainly comes from:

1. Consensus Layer Revenue: Ethereum PoS issuance revenue, relatively fixed
2. Execution layer revenue: The priority fees and MEV paid by users, which are quite volatile.

The business logic and revenue structure of Eigenlayer

Eigenlayer proposes the concept of restaking, allowing staked ETH to be staked again for additional returns. Its business logic is:

• Raise assets from ETH stakers and pay fees
• Charge fees to protocols that require AVS
• Act as a "protocol security market" to facilitate and take a cut.

The actual returns of the current restaking projects are still mainly in tokens/points, and the demand side is still unclear.

Liquid restaking ( Etherfi )'s way of survival

Projects like Etherfi and LRT enable users to participate in staking and restaking in a simpler way. Their survival space comes from:

1. Lido does not provide liquid restaking services.
2. Eigenlayer does not provide liquid staking services.

This part is brought about by the Ethereum Foundation's "distrust" of Lido and Eigenlayer.

Ethereum stake ecology protocol analysis

There are three sources of long-term returns related to staking activities:

1. PoS underlying revenue: the chain pays the native token for maintaining consensus.
2. Transaction sorting revenue: fees obtained by nodes packaging transactions.
3. Staking asset rental income: Fees obtained by lending staking assets to other protocols.

There are three types of stake-related protocols on the Ethereum network:

1. Liquid staking agreement ( such as Lido ): obtain two types of returns 1 and 2
2. Restaking protocol ( such as Eigenlayer ): Obtain the third type of yield
3. Liquid restaking protocol ( like Etherfi ): theoretically can obtain all 3 types of收益

Currently, the ETH stake yield is continuously declining, and the market ceiling is gradually becoming apparent, which is one of the reasons for the poor performance of related tokens.

Solana's staking and restaking

Solana's liquid staking is similar to Ethereum, but the restaking mechanism is different, primarily based on the swQoS mechanism.

swQoS determines transaction priority based on the stake amount, rapidly increasing the success rate of network transactions. Solayer provides a "transaction pass-through rental platform" based on swQoS, serving protocols that require transaction reliability.

Solayer's restaking business process

1. Users deposit SOL to obtain sSOL.
2. Stake SOL on Solayer to earn basic rewards
3. Users can delegate sSOL to protocols that require transaction throughput to earn additional rewards.

Solayer combines LST and restaking, similar to Lido which supports native restaking.

Analysis of the Business Prospects of Solayer Restaking

Comparing the staking yields of Ethereum and Solana:

1. PoS underlying earnings: SOL has surpassed ETH and the gap is widening.

2. Transaction Sorting Revenue: Solana REV shows an upward trend, recently surpassing Ethereum.

3. Staking asset rental income: Solana swQoS brings additional transaction throughput demand

Solana stake related agreements have a larger market and potential:

• Higher yield baseline
• On-chain activity is better
• There is an additional demand for transaction throughput.
• The protocol can freely expand its business according to commercial logic.

Although Solana restaking has not yet found a clear PMF, it has more development potential than Ethereum. This trend may further expand in the future.