EigenLayer: Employees' Wallets Enriched by Token Contributions

EigenLayer: Employees' Wallets Enriched by Token Contributions

EigenLabs' employees are under fire for allegedly pressuring projects seeking to issue tokens to provide funds to their personal wallets, as reported by Coindesk. EigenLabs is the firm behind EigenLayer, an Ethereum restaking protocol. The alleged demand for token allocations by EigenLayer has caused widespread concern. Coindesk's report sheds light on the practice of several projects receiving unsolicited lists of wallet addresses and being pressured into token transfers despite refraining from requesting them. EigenLabs is accused of amassing tens of millions of dollars through these practices. A simple calculation reveals that each EigenLabs employee may have received approximately $80,000. The controversy sparked a flurry of reactions from industry insiders, with some expressing skepticism about the appropriateness of distributing tokens directly to employees. Despite the raised eyebrows, EigenLabs' response maintained that it had implemented measures to prevent conflicts of interest since May, prohibiting employees from receiving airdrops from affiliated projects and engaging in activities that could personally benefit them at the company's expense. However, EigenLabs confirmed that it would not recover any airdrops received by employees prior to the revised regulations. Other projects involved in this controversy have offered explanations for providing tokens to EigenLabs employees. Etherfi claimed to have simply requested a list of personal addresses to express gratitude, while Lenzo offered a similar rationale. This incident has brought the practice of token distributions by projects to individual employees under scrutiny, raising questions about conflicts of interest and industry norms.