SharpLink plans to pledge US$200 million in ETH through Lido

SharpLink, a Nasdaq-listed company, plans to pledge US$200 million in ETH through Lido and hand it over to Anchorage Digital to host the wstETH it has obtained, in order to expand its revenue strategy of Ethereum corporate treasury.

Core Points

SharpLink plans to pledge US$200 million in ETH through Lido in exchange for wstETH.

Anchorage Digital will host wstETH and incorporate Lido into SharpLink's existing institutional pledge and re-pledge strategies.

According to the latest quarterly earnings report, SharpLink held 888,938 ETH equivalents as of August 3.

Lido reported that the total amount of ETH pledged in its agreements was approximately US$16.5 billion, and wstETH has integrated more than 100 agreements.

SharpLink shares rose 2.3% to US$6.32 on Thursday, with after-hours ETH trading at close to US$1,625.

The company announced the configuration plan on August 13, but did not disclose a transaction hash or a timetable showing that all deployments had been completed.

Just days before the deployment announcement, SharpLink reported that it held 888,938 ETH and ETH equivalents as of August 3. Its latest quarterly documents show that pledges have become the main source of revenue, with $11.2 million of the $11.5 million revenue in the second quarter coming from pledge business.

The deal is SharpLink's deployment of its existing Ethereum treasury, rather than an announcement that it will buy another $200 million of ETH. The company pledged ETH through Lido to receive wstETH-an ERC-20 token that represents the share of ETH pledged through the agreement.

Unlike stETH, wstETH does not increase the token balance when rewards are accumulated, but is reflected through changes in its redemption value with stETH. According to Lido documentation, this design makes it easier to integrate into DeFi applications that do not support heavy-base tokens.

Lido said that approximately US$16.5 billion of ETH is currently pledged through its agreements, its liquid pledged assets have been integrated with more than 100 agreements, and approximately US$10 billion is actively used as collateral or for other applications. SharpLink has not disclosed in which DeFi protocol it will deploy the new wstETH after receiving it.

Anchorage Digital adds a regulated hosting layer to policy

Anchorage Digital will host SharpLink's wstETH. The arrangement is based on Anchorage's integration with Lido in July, allowing institutional customers to cast and redeem wstETH on a managed platform. Anchorage Digital Bank is a national trust bank chartered by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).

This Lido configuration expands the company's existing treasury strategy, which previously covered native pledge, liquidity pledge and re-pledge. SharpLink once allocated US$200 million of its Ethereum fund to ether.fi and EigenCloud's Linea repledge project, and subsequently invested US$100 million in the US$125 million chain income fund managed by Galaxy.

CEO Joseph Chalom said the Lido configuration will make SharpLink's ETH "more productive" and give the company access to wstETH's DeFi integration capabilities. But these benefits are not guaranteed to be realized. Lido itself also warned that pledge rewards fluctuate, and users face smart contracts, forfeitures, withdrawals, liquidity and market risks.

U.S. regulations provide a clearer but limited path for liquidity pledges

For the Nasdaq-listed company, the U.S. regulatory background is equally important. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) corporate finance department stated in August 2025 that certain liquidity pledge arrangements (depending on their structure and specific facts) do not involve securities trading. The statement is a staff guidance, not a committee rule, and does not cover all liquidity pledge models.

SharpLink also faces the accounting impact of holding liquid pledged tokens. In second-quarter results, the company recorded an impairment of $76.1 million on existing LsETH and weETH positions. Previous reports showed that these impairment charges resulted in SharpLink's net loss of $394.3 million in the second quarter. SharpLink has not disclosed how the new wstETH position will be classified in its accounts.

Next step for SharpLink's US$200 million configuration

The next specific step is to actually transfer ETH to Lido and receive wstETH at Anchorage Digital. SharpLink's announcement did not disclose a deployment timetable, expected pledge rates or further DeFi strategies for the tokens.

After the pledge plan was announced before the U.S. trading session, SharpLink shares closed at US$6.32 on August 13, up approximately 2.27% from the previous closing price. ETH was trading at close to US$1,625 that day. These price fluctuations coincide with the announcement time, but it is impossible to determine whether the announcement directly caused the trend.