Two years ago, when you heard Restaking, you probably asked: • What value beyond APR does it give? • Does it even work? • What exactly is this thing all about? Today, that economy has expanded beyond such an experiment. It is now an economic structure for trust coordination that allows networks to buy security, and allows stakers and operators to sell it. The questions that matter now are: • Who pays? • How are rewards distributed? • What happens if something breaks? • And how flexible are the rules? This is why we will be evaluating and comparing the models of four Restaking Protocols: EigenCloud, Karak, Babylon, and Symbiotic. @eigenlayer is a heavyweight that keeps Ethereum at the center and gives AVSs the ability to pay for security. Rewards are given through a coordinator, and slashing can either burn or redistribute, depending on what is enforced. However, when you exit, you have to wait for days in the queue. EIGEN works at scale, but there is little to no flexibility in there. @Karak_Network, on the other hand, is built around Distributed Secure Services (DDS). DSS decides how stakers and operators are paid and how slashing is applied. The model supports multiple assets across EVM, which makes it broad. But the structure is tied to DSS rules, so flexibility is not as open as it sounds. We also have @babylonlabs_io, a Bitcoin-native restaking platform. Babylon brings Bitcoin into the economy. It keeps coins on the BTC chain and enforces slashing with fixed penalty ratios. That predictability makes it appealing to Bitcoin-aligned systems, though the scope is narrow. @symbioticfi uses a completely different approach. The Modular Restaking. Every vault defines its own rules. On Symbiotic, Slashing can be instant or vetoed, and exits are defined at the vault level. As such, any ERC-20 can be collateral if slashing support is present. It does not rely on one dominant asset, and the flexibility makes it adaptable across different networks. ----- Remember in June, Symbiotic introduced 𝗥𝗲𝗹𝗮𝘆, a mechanism that allows stake on Ethereum to be verified across other chains without relying on relayers or multisigs. With Relay, bridges, rollups, and oracles can all share the same base of trust. This makes shared security composable, interoperable, and efficient. Relay proved that security can scale beyond a single chain and coordinate across multiple chains. Now, Symbiotic is introducing an incentive layer, known as 𝗘𝘅𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗥𝗲𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱𝘀. This is a mechanism where networks compensate stakers, operators, or contributors directly in their own tokens. There is no need for custom infrastructure or side agreements. A network can onboard and bootstrap security immediately using its native economy as the payment rail. External Rewards are already in use. We have: → @hyperlane paying $HYPER for securing its warp routes. → @sparkdotfi using $SPK and points in its staking layer. → Also, @TanssiNetwork, @cyclenetwork_GO, @Ditto_Network, @KalypsoProver, @primev_xyz, and @OmniFDN are already plugged into Symbiotic’s system. Effectively, for these networks, this means security spend is predictable and programmable. While for stakers and operators, rewards are native and aligned with the systems they secure. With External Rewards, expect: • Reward aggregators to abstract away complexity. • A market where stakers and operators choose which network to secure based on pay. • Wrappers to turn reward streams into liquid assets. When protocols compete for stakers and operators, security becomes a competitive market good. In conclusion, Restaking is now past trial and error. It is a core economic framework in crypto where value is exchanged for trust. The growth ahead will be measured by how networks compete to buy security and how stakers and operators respond to that demand. What you see now is the early stage of security becoming its own economy. Thanks for reading!