EigenLayer

EigenLayer (EigenCloud) is the pioneering restaking protocol: ETH stakers and LST holders restake to extend cryptoeconomic security to Actively Validated Services (AVSs) in exchange for additional rewards.

Created the restaking primitive; the largest pool of restaked security and the base layer most LRTs build on.

- Restaking core (EigenLayer protocol): A set of Ethereum smart contracts that let stakers 'restake' ETH or liquid staking tokens to extend Ethereum's economic security to other applications. Restakers opt in by delegating to operators, who in turn secure Actively Validated Services (AVSs). - Actively Validated Services (AVSs): Applications and services (data availability layers, oracles, bridges, coprocessors, etc.) that consume restaked security. AVSs define operational conditions and Service Level Agreements enforced economically via slashing. - Operators: Node operators who receive delegated restake from stakers and run the off-chain software required by the AVSs they opt into. Operators are the entities subject to slashing if they fail to meet AVS commitments. - EIGEN token: The protocol's work token, designed to complement ETH restaking by handling 'intersubjective faults' — misbehavior not objectively provable on-chain. Its core mechanism is 'intersubjective forking,' allowing EIGEN to fork without forking Ethereum mainnet. - EigenCloud (EigenDA / EigenVerify / EigenCompute): A developer platform announced in 2025 that packages EigenLayer's verifiability primitives into unified services: EigenDA (data availability), EigenVerify (dispute resolution) and EigenCompute (execution), letting developers build apps with on-chain trust guarantees for off-chain computation.

- Smart Contract: Restaked ETH and LSTs are held in EigenLayer's core strategy and delegation contracts. A bug in the restaking, delegation, withdrawal or slashing logic could lead to loss or wrongful burning of staked assets across many restakers at once. - Systemic: Restaking layers new services on the same underlying ETH stake. Correlated slashing or cascading failures across multiple AVSs sharing the same operators/collateral could concentrate losses and, given EigenLayer's dominant share of restaking TVL, stress the broader Ethereum staking economy. - Counterparty: Operator concentration risk: stakers delegate to a limited set of operators who run the off-chain AVS software. A poorly run, malicious or compromised operator can be slashed (funds burned) since April 2025, causing losses for the restakers who delegated to it. - Governance: The EIGEN token introduces 'intersubjective forking' — social-consensus resolution of faults that cannot be proven on-chain. This gives token holders / social consensus discretionary power over what counts as misbehavior, and the Eigen Foundation controls emissions/incentives, creating governance and centralization risk. - Collateral: Restaked collateral (ETH and liquid staking tokens) is exposed to the risk of the underlying LST depegging or the Ethereum consensus-layer slashing that already applies to staked ETH, compounded by the additional AVS-level slashing conditions layered on top.

- Reinsurance / shared collateral pools: similar — Like reinsurance, restaking lets one pool of capital (staked ETH) underwrite the security of many separate services simultaneously, improving capital efficiency.; differs — EigenLayer's guarantees are enforced automatically by on-chain slashing rather than legal contracts, and the underwriting capital is pooled crypto stake that can be burned for misbehavior.