Ethereum Foundation leverages staking to finance operations and strengthen blockchain security.
The Ethereum Foundation (EF), which supports the development of the Ethereum blockchain, has started staking a portion of its treasury holdings to fund operations and bolster network security, the team announced on Tuesday.
The foundation made an initial deposit of 2,016 ETH today, with plans to stake roughly 70,000 ETH in total. Staking rewards will flow back into the organization’s treasury to support protocol research, ecosystem development, and community grants.
The decision comes after the EF introduced a Treasury Policy in June 2025, establishing an asset-liability model based on a 15% annual spending rate relative to total treasury value and a 2.5-year operating runway. Historically reliant on direct ETH sales, the foundation is now increasingly turning to staking and DeFi strategies to support long-term sustainability.
For the staking infrastructure, the team is using Dirk and Vouch, open-source tools developed by Attestant. Dirk functions as a distributed signing system operated by individuals across multiple jurisdictions, eliminating any single point of failure for validation duties.
Vouch enables the use of several client pairings with built-in strategies designed to reduce risks tied to client concentration. The setup also incorporates minority clients and a combination of hosted and self-managed hardware spread across different regions.
The foundation holds more than 172,00 ETH in reserves, valued at around $315 million, and over 10,000 Wrapped Ethereum (WETH), per Arkham Intelligence.
