- Products from BlackRock, Grayscale, and REX-Osprey now offer investors passive ETH staking yields of up to ~2.72%, forcing corporate treasury holders to justify their premium with active strategies.
- Unlike native staking, liquid staking lets treasury companies earn rewards while simultaneously using transferable tokens across DeFi protocols for additional yield.
- Sharplink Gaming, the second-largest corporate ETH holder, generated over $30M in staking rewards, with one-third coming from liquid staking, per SEC filings.
Corporate Ethereum holders are being pushed to rethink how they generate returns — and liquid staking is emerging as the strategy that could separate the winners from the also-rans.
The Bar Has Been Raised by ETF Competition
The launch of several US-listed staked Ether ETFs has fundamentally changed the competitive landscape for Ether treasury companies. Products from BlackRock, Grayscale, and REX-Osprey now give everyday investors direct access to staking rewards without the complexity of managing crypto assets directly.
As of early April, Grayscale’s staking products were delivering net rewards between 2.26% and 2.56%, while native ETH staking hovered around 2.72% annually. For corporate Ether holders pitching themselves as superior alternatives, those numbers set a difficult baseline to beat — and simply mirroring passive staking income may not be enough.
Kean Gilbert, head of institutional relations at Lido, made this point plainly at ETHCC 2026: treasury companies that want to justify their premium valuations need active yield strategies, and liquid staking is central to that toolkit. Unlike conventional staking, liquid staking allows ETH holders to stake tokens while simultaneously receiving a transferable token that can be deployed across decentralized finance protocols — effectively putting the same assets to work twice.
Active Management vs. Passive Products
Not everyone agrees that treasury companies are obligated to outpace staked ETF yields outright. Jimmy Xue, co-founder and COO of quantitative yield platform Axis, argues the comparison misses the point.
According to Xue, staked ETH ETFs are fundamentally passive vehicles, while corporate treasury entities trading at a premium to net asset value are implicitly promising something more dynamic — active, opportunistic deployment of spot ETH inventory across a shifting market. The premium investors pay, he argues, reflects their bet on management’s execution ability, not just a yield differential. Basis trading, he noted, is one major income stream treasury firms can exploit that ETFs structurally cannot.
What Public Filings Reveal
Real-world adoption of liquid staking among corporate holders is already underway. Sharplink Gaming, currently the second-largest corporate Ethereum holder, disclosed generating approximately 14,516 ETH — roughly $30.8 million — in staking rewards through March. Its strategy splits between native staking (66%) and liquid staking (33%), according to an SEC filing from March 1.
Despite those gains, Sharplink posted a net loss of $734 million for 2025, largely a consequence of the broader crypto market downturn in the latter half of the year — a reminder that yield strategies alone cannot insulate treasury companies from macro headwinds.
The rise of institutional-grade staked ETH products has effectively set a public benchmark. For Ether treasury companies, the calculus is now clear: passive staking is table stakes, not a differentiator. Liquid staking, collateralized borrowing, and active DeFi deployment may well determine which treasury firms justify investor confidence — and which quietly fade into irrelevance.
Disclaimer: The information in this article is for general purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. The author’s views are personal and may not reflect the views of ChainRant.com. Before making any investment decisions, you should always conduct your own research. ChainRant.com is not responsible for any financial losses.