Why Ethereum's Co-Creator Doesn't Stake All His Coins: The Inside Story

Vitalik Buterin, co-creator of Ethereum, doesn't stake all his Ethereum due to the complexity of "multisig" wallets. On a recent Bankless Podcast episode, he shared that he only stakes a little of his Ethereum because staking Ethereum needs keys that must be public and online. Multisig wallets for staking are tough to set up and can be tricky.

Charles Hoskinson, another Ethereum co-creator and founder of Cardano, was surprised by this. He tweeted that he stakes all of his Cardano.

Buterin also talked about the EigenLayer protocol, which lets Ethereum holders stake their assets on new networks. However, he worried about it causing too much centralization. He said: 

"Good stakers are valued more than bad ones. Good stakers are less likely to get punished.”

Sreeram Kaanan, the creator of EigenLayer, agreed that restaking can have risks. He emphasized the importance of careful planning and considering the overall ecosystem benefits. 

Buterin earlier stated that Ethereum might "fail" without enough improvements to make transactions cheaper. He also mentioned the difficulties when users have smart contract wallets and control multiple addresses at the same time.