Everyone is talking about L2 zKEVMs on Ethereum but miss another major catalyst - decentralized trust on Ethereum via Eigenlayer

EigenLayer is built on Ethereum and enables users to restake their ETH and extend cryptoeconomic security of Ethereum to additional applications such as oracles, bridges, L2s on the network.

A current challenge within blockchains is fragmented security. This is especially true on the Ethereum network. At a very high level, middleware and non-EVM (Ethereum Virtual Machine) applications built on top of Ethereum are responsible for generating their own trust network - unlike dapps, which are secured on the smart contract level. This is inefficient in many ways. Self maintained security is expensive, resource-intensive, and takes a considerable time to generate. Moreover, once launched, a decentralized security network requires ongoing effort to scale.

EigenLayer launches a mechanism in cryptoeconomic security called “restaking” to overcome these challenges and aggregate security across Ethereum. Restaking functions as a set of smart contracts in which users that stake ETH can repurpose their locked ETH to extend cryptoeconomic security to other applications built on the network, basically lending out trust of the main chain. Ultimately, EigenLayer’s design allows staked ETH to provide validation services - for additional staking fees - beyond just Ethereum itself.

Advantages of Eigenlayer: - Developers can begin to focus more on innovation and building products, and less on bootstrapping security - For end users, restaking presents a significant improvement in value accrual opportunities. Stakers today essentially lock their capital to earn a reward for contributing to network security. However, they must forgo other opportunities to do so. The advent of liquid staking derivatives and restaking creates more capital efficiency by enabling token holders to deploy the staking derivative capital elsewhere to earn additional yield - Restaking improves Ethereum fee model since it creates a flow of value that grows along with the network

Eigenlayer just today released their whitepaper and soon expects to launch their testnet, the release of the product is expected later in 2023.

http://eigenlayer.xyz/whitepaper.pdf

TLDR: Eigenlayer allows Ethereum to lend out its network security to EVM compatible projects, saving them money and efforts and give additional staking returns to stakers willing to take on additional slashing risks