Ethereum Unstaking Queue Soars 392%, Hits Year-High

Ethereum's unstaking queue has surged to its highest level this year, reaching 392% growth since October began. By October 2, around 850,000 ETH was lined up to exit the network's validator set. This represents a significant increase from late September, when exits were in the low-to-mid 100,000s ETH range.

The estimated wait time for validators to exit had reached approximately 14.77 days by October 2. The total staked ETH stood at roughly 43.6 million across about 878,000 active validators. This means that pending exits represented close to 2% of all staked supply.

The sudden increase in the queue has been linked to a compromise of MetaMask Staking's infrastructure on September 30. The incident led to nearly 17,000 validators holding approximately 523,000 ETH being moved out as a precautionary measure. This significant share of exits was tied to Lido's operations.