Restaking
Reusing staked ETH's security to protect additional protocols for extra yield — with correlated slashing risk attached.
Restaking lets already-staked assets (chiefly ETH, via EigenLayer and successors) simultaneously secure additional services — oracles, bridges, data layers — earning extra rewards on the same capital. Services rent established economic security instead of bootstrapping their own validator sets.
The catch is stacked, correlated risk: each additional commitment adds a slashing condition, and liquid restaking tokens (LRTs) layer smart-contract exposure on top. Critics warn of hidden leverage on Ethereum’s security base; proponents call it a security marketplace. A 2024–25 headline narrative that matured into infrastructure by 2026 — with yields that compensate thoughtful users and punish yield-tourists who never read the slashing terms.