What proportion of pledged ETH does Lido control?

Currently, there is no single reliable figure on Lido's share of pledged Ethereum.

There are three figures circulating in the existing information-46.5%, about 23% and "more than 32%"-each figure measures data from different periods of time and different caliber, and its calculation method is either clear, partially explained, or completely missing.

The three numbers and their respective measures

The largest number, 46.5%, comes from DefiLlama's Lido protocol real-time page. According to DefiLlama, Lido ranks first in total locked value among the liquidity pledge agreements it tracks (the website says such agreements cover 270), and notes that Lido accounts for 46.5% of the total locked value in this category. This is Lido's share of the liquidity pledge TVL-it excludes ETH pledged directly outside the liquidity pledge agreement, which is not at all included in DefiLlama's category statistics. The DefiLlama dashboard is constantly updated and there is no fixed release date in the sources reviewed; the above percentages are just a snapshot of a moment in time and may be outdated when you read this page.

The second figure, close to 23%, comes from an article by Datawallet that said it was last updated on June 22, 2026. Datawallet wrote that Lido's "Internet share has slipped to about 23%," compared with its claimed 2023 peak of 32%. Unlike Datawallet's separate statement on total pledge ETH, which is quoted from beaconcha.in and hildobby's Dune dashboards, this specific percentage does not indicate the source or calculation method in the materials reviewed on this page. Therefore, it is impossible to verify how Datawallet calculated this number based on the existing information alone, nor to determine the specific date it refers to (except for the June 22, 2026 update date noted in the article).

The third figure "over 32%" appears in a governance note by Messari-but this page views a summary of the note rather than the complete document, and only confirms one original sentence: Messari pointed out that because Lido DAO "controls stETH's code and whitelists its node operators, the protocol may be maliciously modified, thereby stealing users 'pledged ETH." The figure of 32% and the Lido DAO treasury valuation of approximately US$400 million appear only in the summary held on this page, not the original text, so this page cannot independently verify how Messari calculated these numbers, nor is it clear where they are. Messari's summary also raised a broader concern-paraphrasing rather than quoting here because the underlying language was not available-that Lido's size could pose a risk of cartelization and coerce pledgers.

DefiLlama's own agreement page gives different treasury figures-according to DefiLlama, US$131.13 million-and neither source explains the difference. This page cannot reconcile the two, so we report both rather than choosing a seemingly more accurate number.

Lido's own V3 white paper provides a fourth data point, although it is not an expression of Lido's share. The white paper states that as of the end of 2025,"nearly 30% of ETH has been pledged," covering the sum of native and liquidity pledges, and that since 2023, the proportion of liquidity pledges has declined as more ETH has shifted to customized illiquidity settings. This is a statement of the entire pledge field, not a specific figure for Lido, and the white paper does not quantify Lido's share of it.

Why don't the numbers match

The core issue lies in the denominator. DefiLlama clearly stated its denominator: Lido's TVL is only divided by the TVL of other liquidity pledge agreements-the market itself is a subset of all pledged ETH, because a large number of ETH are pledged natively, do not issue liquid tokens, and are not within the categories tracked by DefiLlama. Datawallet and Messari did not state the denominator so clearly. The working assumption on this page-because Messari's explanation discusses Lido's size in the context of the overall Ethereum validator set, and Datawallet's total pledged ETH statistics also appear in other parts of the same article-is that both numbers attempt to measure Lido's share of all pledged ETH, not just the share of liquidity pledged TVL. However, neither source confirmed this method in the data reviewed, so this is still an inference on this page rather than a verifiable fact.

The date issue complicates the situation. Datawallet's 23% corresponds to a review on June 22, 2026;Messari's "over 32%" is undated and comes from summaries rather than complete documents;DefiLlama's 46.5% is real-time data without a fixed timestamp; and nearly 30% of the data in the white paper is labeled as the end of 2025, but describes the total pledged ETH rather than Lido's share. Treating any two of these numbers as a description of the same moment in time would lead to misleading trends. Comparing Messari's undated "over 32%" with Datawallet's 23%(June 2026) and concluding that Lido's share dropped significantly, assumes that the two numbers measure the same thing at two comparable points in time-a point that available evidence does not confirm.

A specific comparison

Datawallet reported that as of June 15, 2026, the total pledged ETH reached 39,673,448-Datawallet cited beaconcha.in and hildobby's Dune dashboard data that increased by more than 4 million ETH in about five and a half months. This figure-all ETH locked in the Ethereum proof-of-stake system, including native pledges and liquidity pledges-is likely to be the denominator behind the Datawallet and Messari percentage statements based on the inference on this page, although as noted above, neither source clearly states this. DefiLlama's 46.5% uses a narrower denominator: it only refers to the liquidity pledge TVL in the 270 agreements it tracks, completely excluding the native pledge ETH. These two percentages can accurately describe Lido's situation at the same time, correspond to two different markets, and are not contradictory to each other.

Why this goes beyond arithmetic

Lido's size is the basis of Messari's note's specific argument about the Ethereum consensus layer: Since Lido DAO sets which node operators can run the validator behind stETH and controls the underlying code, if the governance mechanism is captured or abused, a large enough share is concentrated under the governance of one DAO, it increases the risk of cartelization or coercing pledgers. Whether the argument describes an agreement that holds 23%,"more than 32%" or 46.5% of the relevant total will affect its severity-so it is crucial to figure out which number is used and what it measures before reaching a conclusion.

Lido's own governance document (published at lido.fi/governance) describes LDO token holders as governing the agreement "through a regular process that relies on an established framework and voting platform that relies on community approval," and notes that the agreement is "protected by stETH holders through a dual governance system." The documents reviewed on this page do not elaborate on the specific content of this protection measure. Whether it is sufficient to address Messari's concerns about scale is a question that cannot be settled on this page.

This page failed to inform you

This page cannot give a single reliable figure on Lido's current share of all pledged ETH, as all sources reviewed do not comprehensively describe its calculation method, date and denominator in the same place (all pledged ETH vs. liquidity pledged TVL only). DefiLlama percentages are real-time and may have changed as you read this page; the above 46.5% category share is just a snapshot, not a current value. Datawallet's specific percentage of Lido-about 23%, which is lower than its claimed 2023 peak of 32%-cannot be independently verified based on information reviewed on this page because the article does not source this number as it does its total pledge ETH data. Messari's "more than 32%" figure and its treasury valuation of approximately US$400 million are derived from summaries of its explanation rather than complete documents and are undated in the materials reviewed; the country's database data also conflicts with the US$131.13 million reported by DefiLlama itself, and this page reports both rather than resolving the discrepancy. This page also does not explain why the total amount of liquidity pledge categories tracked by DefiLlama may be different from the liquidity pledge TVL data reported in other places-parties may have counted different sets of agreements, but no explanation exists for the differences. Finally, this page does not delve into Lido's presence on chains other than Ethereum: DefiLlama displays a smaller Solana allocation next to its Ethereum TVL, but does not provide a similar share segmentation; and once a large number of ETH is deposited in stVaults outside the core pool (the structure introduced by the Lido V3 white paper), how to define "Lido's share" is also an outstanding question raised but not answered by the white paper.

Source

Each of the above facts is attributed to one of the above-mentioned reports. If there are differences between them, this article has clearly pointed out.