Liquid Staking APY Calculator

Staking yield on Ethereum comes from three separate sources, and only the first is set by protocol rule. Consensus layer issuance pays validators for attesting and proposing, and it scales inversely with the square root of total ether staked, so the base rate falls as participation grows. Execution layer priority fees and MEV payments are captured only by the validator that proposes a block, making them lumpy for a solo staker but smooth for a pool spreading them across tens of thousands of validators. Net APY to a depositor is gross reward minus the operator commission: Lido applies a 10 percent fee on rewards split between node operators and its treasury, while Rocket Pool node operators take a commission set by protocol parameters. Realistic net figures have generally sat in the 3 to 5 percent range, dropping toward 3 percent as staked supply grew past 25 percent of circulating ether. Liquid staking tokens differ in mechanics in a way that affects how yield appears. Lido stETH is rebasing, so the balance itself grows daily; Rocket Pool rETH and Coinbase cbETH are value-accruing, so the balance is constant while the exchange rate against ether rises, which is why one rETH is always worth more than one ether. This calculator applies daily compounding to the USD value at a fixed price, which isolates the yield effect but does two things worth remembering: it holds the ether price constant across the whole horizon, and it assumes the derivative trades exactly at its redemption value. That second assumption fails under stress, as secondary market discounts are real and were severe in 2022.

Ethereum's proof-of-stake deposit contract opened on 1 December 2020 with the launch of the Beacon Chain, requiring 32 ether per validator and, critically, offering no way to withdraw. That combination of a high minimum and indefinite lockup created the demand liquid staking was built to serve. Lido launched within weeks of the Beacon Chain, issuing stETH against pooled deposits so holders could retain a tradeable claim, and Rocket Pool followed with its permissionless node operator model in November 2021, allowing operators to run validators with a partial bond topped up by pooled ether. The design was stress-tested in June 2022, when forced deleveraging by Celsius and Three Arrows Capital pushed stETH to roughly 0.94 ether on secondary markets. Nothing was wrong with the underlying deposits; the discount reflected the absence of a redemption mechanism while withdrawals remained disabled. The Merge on 15 September 2022 completed the transition to proof of stake and added execution layer fees and MEV to validator income, and the Shapella upgrade on 12 April 2023 finally enabled withdrawals, which closed the arbitrage and largely restored derivatives to parity. Regulatory pressure shaped the market in parallel, most visibly when Kraken settled with the SEC in February 2023 and shut its US staking-as-a-service program. Lido's persistent share of staked ether has since made stake concentration a standing governance concern.