The demand for Ethereum staking has skyrocketed despite the asset price crashing back to bear market lows.
Ethereum’s proof-of-stake contract address now holds over half of the Ether supply “for the first time in the coin’s eleven-year history,” reported on-chain analytics provider Santiment on Wednesday.
This appears somewhat misleading, as approximately 37 million ETH are currently staked, representing approximately 30% of the total supply of 121.4 million tokens. However, Santiment explained that there is often confusion about how the proof-of-stake address works. It described the address as a “one-way vault that temporarily locks ETH to help secure the network.”
“When someone stakes ETH, it gets sent into this contract and is removed from normal circulation, meaning it cannot be spent or traded while it is staked.”
When validators leave and withdraw, the Ether is released back into circulation as newly issued coins on Ethereum’s main network, “rather than being pulled back out of the vault itself,” Santiment explained.
“As a result, the existing supply can often differ based on whether only pre-burned or total post-burned coins are being counted.”
So over time, the “vault” accumulates ETH without it easily flowing back out the same way it went in, making the contract’s share of the current supply appear larger. This results in a calculation of 50.18% based on ETH issued historically before burns. Santiment predicted that this figure will increase, especially during bear markets and poor trading conditions.
“As staking continues to increase in popularity, expect that this address will continue its ascension, particularly when trading slows down during bear cycles.”
Regardless of what figure is taken, the demand for staking has surged, and the percentage of ETH supply staked is at record highs.
Additionally, the validator entry queue is also around record highs, with around 3.9 million ETH waiting to be staked, and the wait time is 67 days.
Meanwhile, the exit queue has dropped to its lowest ever levels with around 11,500 ETH and less than five hours wait.
Panic selling by retail traders has pushed Ether prices to bear market lows below $2,000. ETH touched this psychological level briefly in late Tuesday trading, but again was beaten back by resistance, falling to $1,970 during the Wednesday morning session in Asia.
“Ethereum isn’t expensive right now, it’s boring,” said analyst Merlijn The Trader before adding, “boring is where positions are built.”
