Lido DAO has officially approved a $60 million operating budget for 2026 and outlined a strategy to expand beyond its core liquid staking product into yield vaults, institutional wrappers, and what it calls “real business DeFi.” The plan, detailed in governance proposal GOOSE-3 published on November 24, 2025, sets four priorities: broadening stETH adoption, upgrading protocol infrastructure, scaling new revenue streams through Lido Earn, and building products that bridge off-chain corporate finance with on-chain liquidity.
Lido remains the largest liquid staking provider on Ethereum, controlling approximately 28%–30% of all staked ETH, with total value locked fluctuating between $18 billion and $40 billion depending on market conditions.
Lido V3 and stVaults Go Live
Lido V3 and its stVaults product launched on the Ethereum mainnet on January 30, 2026. The upgrade replaces Lido's previous single-product staking model with a modular infrastructure that allows institutional operators to customize vaults for specific custody, compliance, or yield needs.
Two Lido Earn products — EarnETH and EarnUSD — are also live. They offer structured yield strategies with daily compounding, targeting both retail DeFi users and stablecoin holders seeking returns above base staking rates.
Budget Allocation and Institutional Push
The $60 million budget is split into $43.8 million for core operations and growth and $16.2 million in discretionary resources for high-yield initiatives, including liquidity incentives and institutional product development. On the infrastructure side, the protocol plans to deliver Curated Module v2, Staking Router v3, and a new tool called ValMart — a validator routing system designed to optimize performance, cost, and decentralization simultaneously.
Institutional access forms a separate track. VanEck filed an S-1 with the SEC for a “Lido Staked ETH” ETF on October 20, 2025 — the first U.S. ETF filing to directly reference stETH. As of March 2026, the filing remains under review. In Europe, Wisdomtree launched a “Physical Lido Staked Ether” ETP in December 2025, 100% backed by stETH and listed on Xetra, SIX, and Euronext, with initial AUM between $36 million and $50 million.
Three-Year Outlook
Proposal GOOSE-3 describes staking as a stable core revenue line while the protocol builds products for corporate treasury management, lending, and tokenized assets. Key performance indicators for 2026 include TVL related to stVaults, revenue share from Lido Earn, ETF and ETP approvals, and early traction signals from “real business” pilots.