Bitstamp will terminate its Ethereum staking service for US customers.

Bitstamp to end Ethereum staking service for US customers.

Author: ANA LianGuaiULA PEREIRA, COINTELEGRAPH; Translation: Song Xue, LianGuai

Cryptocurrency exchange Bitstamp will stop offering staking services to US customers. The exchange announced the termination of ETH staking starting from September 25th.

“Customers will continue to receive staking rewards until September 25th, 2023, after which all staked assets will be unstaked. Rewards and principal will be credited to the user’s Bitstamp main account balance.” Bobby Zagotta, CEO and Chief Commercial Officer of Bitstamp US, stated that it may take a few days for the balances of users to reflect these changes.

According to the Bitstamp website, it charges a 15% commission on all staking rewards. The monthly reward rate for staking ETH on the exchange is 4.50%; in comparison, staking Algorand offers a monthly reward of 1.60%. With this move, the US joins the ranks of other countries where Bitstamp does not offer staking services, including Canada, Japan, Singapore, and the UK.

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This decision seems to be related to recent legal developments in the US. In early August, Bitstamp announced that it would no longer offer at least seven altcoins in the country. They are Axie Infinity, Chiliz (CHZ), Decentraland, Polygon, Near, The Sandbox, and Solana. Although the company did not specify the reason for the suspension of trading, these seven tokens are all considered unregistered securities by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The SEC filed lawsuits against cryptocurrency exchanges Binance and Coinbase in June.

Ethereum is the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain and is the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization after Bitcoin. One core question surrounding the ongoing regulatory environment in the US is whether Ethereum can be classified as a commodity or security. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has referred to Ethereum as a commodity multiple times, while SEC Chairman Gary Gensler stated at an April hearing that Bitcoin is a commodity but did not specifically address whether Ethereum should be considered a security.

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