EIGEN token unlock goes live with debut of more than $6.5b FDV

Restaking protocol EigenLayer’s native token EIGEN has officially been launched and is currently trading at $4.10 per token.

On Oct. 1 at 05:00 UTC, EigenLayer‘s token EIGEN was listed on several major exchanges including Binance and MEXC. The token is now transferrable and trading at a fully diluted value reaching over $6.5 billion.

According to data on Coinmarketcap, EIGEN’s price is currently up 10% at $4.10. Around 1.68 billion tokens have entered the market including 86 million tokens that were airdropped to users that interacted with the protocol earlier this year.

One trader on X deposited al total of 5.24 million EIGEN tokens, or approximately $21.5 million USD using five addresses since the token has gone live.

According to EigenLayer’s X post, developers can also build Actively Validated Services using EIGEN staking.

“Stakers play a direct role in securing these services and diversifying use cases, while partners integrate EigenLayer’s security to enhance their protocols,” stated the account @eigenfoundation. The protocol also plans to introduce a programmatic incentives reward for stakers and operators supporting AVSs.

The EIGEN token was described as a “universal intersubjective work token” on the protocol’s website.

According to the blog post, the aim of the token is to solve challenges of “universality, isolation, metering and compensation”. It will also use social consensus and forking to execute a variety of digital tasks.

The protocol is built on Ethereum and accepts ETH deposits, providing users the ability to secure additional networks in return for additional yield.

In recent years, EigenLayer has become one of the biggest players in the crypto industry that offer staking solutions. According to data on DeFi Llama, Eigenlayer has become the third-biggest player in the DeFi industry with over $10.9 billion in total value locked.

The protocol employs staking technology that lets Ethereum stakers reuse their tokens on other protocols. In addition from EigenLayer, other popular liquid staking solutions in the crypto industry include Symbiotic, Puffer Finance, and Lido.