How is Lido V2 Levelling Up Ahead of The Ethereum Shanghai Upgrade?

The journey embarked upon by the largest altcoin by market cap; Ethereum; has pushed a lot more projects and upgrades on various layer 2 protocols. Given the network is set for its second upgrade, Shanghai Upgrade, sometime this year, LDO has been pushing its V2 upgrade. The liquid staking protocol introduced V2 of its protocol in order to expand the Ethereum Node Operator configurations and test withdrawals of ETH.

Today Lido contributors are proud to present Lido V2 – Lido’s largest upgrade to date and an important step towards further decentralization. https://t.co/SDxlxCgMNq pic.twitter.com/KJewhEp8rV

— Lido (@LidoFinance) February 7, 2023

Additional Read: Ethereum Devs Prepare For Shapella Upgrade

There will be a couple of major focal points for this planned upgrade from the Lido liquid staking protocol. These include the introduction of LDO’s new Staking Router and their pathway for enabling withdrawals for takers who have staked Ether! The protocol is set to introduce a Staking Router smart contract, which will help them modularize the node operator registries which contains validators’ private keys; in order to achieve this.

Lido (LDO) price saw a surge in its price since the announcement of the upgrade. The protocol’s value went up by 12% at the time of writing. (February 8, 2023)

Source: CoinMarketCap

So far, the main solution of Lido on Ethereum was given an alternative way to the users to centralized staking platforms. Along with that, the liquid staking protocol was also helping the users in eliminating the technical and financial challenges of running a solo node. While providing the services, the Lido protocol has stuck with providing the highest standard of security and usability to its users.

With the Ethereum Shanghai Upgrade nearing, the crypto ecosystem is gearing up with excitement as the upgrade will be enabling withdrawals to Ethereum stakers; users who have been supporting the network from the initial days of the beacon chain and beyond. Following the upgrade, the V2 of Lido Protocol will help propel the core goal of Lido on Ethereum; which is allowing users the freedom to stake and un-stake at their will.

According to the blog post from the Lido Protocol; the Staking Router; which is a major protocol upgrade; helps in moving the operator registry to a modular and more composable architecture. This Staking Router will now also act as the nucleus of the Lido vision; where Lido is a platform where stakers, developers, and node operators will be able to collaborate without blockage and drive the future of a decentralized Ethereum hand in hand.

Read More: Top Liquid Staking Crypto Tokens

According to the date from Dune Analytics, the Lido Protocol currently has 29% of all staked ETH. The 29% that LDO holds accounts for about 90% of all ETH in liquid staking protocols! The second-highest proportion of staked ETH at 7% remains with Rocketpool, while Frax Finance is third at 1.5%.