The Risks and Realities of Leverage Staking

Abstract and 1. Introduction

2. Related Work

3 Background

3.1 Blockchain and DeFi

3.2 Ethereum PoS

3.3 Staking Options

3.4 LSD

3.5 DeFi Lending Protocols

4 System Model and 4.1 System Participants

4.2 Leverage Staking with LSDs

5 Analytical Study

6 Empirical Study

7 Cascading Liquidation

7.1 stETH Price Deviation and Terra Crash

7.2 Cascading Liquidation and User Behaviors

8 Stress Testing

8.1 Motivation and 8.2 Simulation

9 Discussion and Future Research Directions

10 Conclusion and References

A. Aave Parameter Configuration

B. Generalized Formalization For Leverage Staking

C. Leverage Staking Detection Algorithm

This section conducts an analytical study on the leverage staking strategy. We also offer a generalized formalization encompassing other potential scenarios in Appendix B.

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\ In addition to the standardized scenario discussed above, real-world applications of leverage staking can vary significantly among users. For instance, a user might choose not to reinvest all of their received stETH on Aave. For a more detailed exploration of this variability, please see the generalized formalization in Appendix B.

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:::info Authors:

(1) Xihan Xiong, Imperial College London, UK;

(2) Zhipeng Wang, Imperial College London, UK;

(3) Xi Chen, University of Sussex, UK;

(4) William Knottenbelt, Imperial College London, UK;

(5) Michael Huth, Imperial College London, UK.

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:::info This paper is available on arxiv under CC BY 4.0 DEED license.

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[8] https://docs.aave.com/risk/liquidity-risk/borrow-interest-rate