About StakeStone (STO)

What Is StakeStone (STO)?

StakeStone is a liquidity protocol that issues yield-bearing representations of ETH, Bitcoin and stablecoins and then distributes them across many chains. It runs vaults on Ethereum and BNB Chain, mints a token representing a share of each vault, and mirrors that token onto other networks through bridging adapters, so a single deposit can be used in several ecosystems at once.

STO is the governance token of that system. Locking STO produces veSTO, and veSTO votes decide where emissions go, what fees the protocol charges, and what share of incentive deposits is destroyed.

Official sources:

• StakeStone
• StakeStone documentation
• StakeStone Whitepaper 2.0

Who Founded StakeStone? (History)

StakeStone began in 2023 around STONE, a liquid staking token for ETH aimed at newer Layer 2 networks that held ETH deposits but offered no native staking yield. Public profiles attribute the project to a founder who publishes under the name Charles K, with funding reported from several crypto funds. The documentation does not publish a full named roster, so treat individual attributions as secondary.

What can be checked directly is the deployment record. STONE, the STONE vault, SBTC, STONEBTC and STONEUSD all exist as live contracts on Ethereum with non-zero supply.

How StakeStone Works

StakeStone is easiest to follow in four steps.

1. Deposit and mint A user deposits ETH, a Bitcoin-backed ERC-20, or stablecoins into a vault and receives a vault token in return.

2. Non-rebasing accounting The vault token does not grow in count. Value accrues through an exchange rate stored in the contract. The STONE contract on Ethereum exposes a tokenPrice function, and a read of it on 2026-09-11 returned roughly 1.072 ETH per STONE, meaning the token has appreciated against ETH since launch rather than splitting into more units.

3. Strategy allocation by vote Where the underlying assets are deployed is decided through the Optimizing Portfolio and Allocation Proposal process, known as OPAP. STONE holders vote on chain, and approved changes pass through a timelock of at least one day, usually three to seven days. Strategies approved in the past include EigenLayer, Symbiotic, Rocket Pool, Curve, Balancer and Mellow.

4. Omnichain distribution Vault tokens are mirrored onto other networks through bridging adapters, so the same position can be held on Ethereum, BNB Chain, Base, Arbitrum, Scroll, Linea, Mantle, Berachain and others without redeeming first.

Key Ecosystem Components

• STONE, an ETH vault token whose contract name reads "StakeStone Ether"
• SBTC and STONEBTC, two Bitcoin-denominated vault tokens
• STONEUSD, a stablecoin vault token backed by market-neutral strategies run largely on centralized venues, with permissioned mint and redeem behind KYC checks and weekly redemptions
• LiquidityPad, which lets a new chain launch a pre-deposit vault so Ethereum liquidity can be committed to that ecosystem on defined terms
• STONE Pools, BTC Pools and the Gauge system, which route STO emissions to chosen pools through bi-weekly veSTO votes
• Stone Wallet and the Earn module, the consumer-facing surface of the newer StakeStone 2.0 documentation

STO Token Utility

STO has a documented total supply of 1,000,000,000. A direct read of the Ethereum contract at 0x1D88713b483A8E45cfF0e5CD7c2e15E5Fab4534d on 2026-09-11 returned exactly that figure, and the deployed bytecode contains no mint function, no burn function and no owner function, so the Ethereum issuance is fixed and has no administrator able to change it. The BNB Chain contract at 0xdAf1695c41327b61B9b9965Ac6A5843A3198cf07 does contain a mint function, which is consistent with a bridged representation created and destroyed as tokens move between chains rather than a second independent issuance. The two per-chain figures should not be added together.

Locked STO becomes veSTO, which is used to:

• direct STO emissions across STONE-Fi pools, BTC-Fi pools and LiquidityPad vaults
• vote on protocol parameters such as platform fees and the share of incentive deposits that is burned
• boost the yield a liquidity provider earns, in proportion to how much veSTO is locked against the deposit
• claim a share of the incentive deposits placed by protocols competing for liquidity

The documentation also describes a Swap and Burn mechanism, in which STO can be exchanged for a proportional share of treasury assets while the STO used is removed from circulation. Note that the Ethereum STO contract exposes no public burn entry point, so any such destruction is implemented in surrounding protocol contracts rather than in the L1 token itself. Confirm the mechanism in the live application before relying on it.

What Makes StakeStone Unique?

Three things separate StakeStone from a plain liquid staking token. Strategy selection is a voted, timelocked, on-chain process rather than an operator decision. The same vault pattern has been reused across three collateral types instead of one. And LiquidityPad treats liquidity as something a chain can raise on terms, rather than something it must rent indefinitely through emissions.

How StakeStone Differs from Similar Protocols

Compared with single-asset liquid staking protocols, StakeStone is less a staking front end and more a vault and distribution layer. Compared with restaking protocols, it runs no validator or operator marketplace of its own, it allocates into strategies other teams run. Compared with a bridge, it moves only its own vault tokens.

The tradeoff is that it inherits the risk of every strategy it allocates into, plus the messaging layer it uses to distribute tokens.

Use Cases of StakeStone

• Holding a yield-bearing ETH, Bitcoin or stablecoin position that stays usable as collateral elsewhere
• Supplying liquidity to an emerging chain through a pre-deposit vault
• Locking STO to direct emissions and collect incentive deposits
• Using one vault token across several networks without redeeming first

How StakeStone Is Secured

Security rests on the vault and adapter contracts, the OPAP timelock, the quality of the approved strategies, and the bridging infrastructure used for distribution. The project maintains audit and bug bounty pages in its documentation. Because deposits are pooled and then deployed, a failure in any single approved strategy affects every holder of that vault token, not only the users who would have chosen it.

Risks and Considerations

• Strategy risk. The vault tokens are only as safe as the protocols OPAP has approved.
• Counterparty risk in STONEUSD, which the documentation states is backed largely by arbitrage strategies operated on centralized exchanges.
• Bridge and messaging risk on every chain where a mirrored vault token circulates.
• Governance concentration, since veSTO voting power follows both size and lock duration.
• Contract identity risk. At least one unrelated BNB Chain contract, 0xa45f3c223c2407113f7f9157f594c14f132da97f, also reports the name "StakeStone" and the symbol "STO" with a supply of 100,000,000,000 tokens. Always confirm the address against the official documentation before interacting.
• Direction risk. The newer documentation reframes the protocol as a consumer banking product, which is a materially different business from an omnichain vault layer.

Why StakeStone Matters

StakeStone addressed a practical gap. Newer chains attract deposits but cannot offer native staking yield, and users do not want to surrender yield in order to use a new ecosystem. Packaging yield into a transferable, non-rebasing token and shipping it elsewhere proved to be a reusable pattern, now applied to three separate collateral types with live contracts behind each.

Where Can You Buy StakeStone (STO)?

STO trades on centralized exchanges and on decentralized venues on BNB Chain and Ethereum. Availability, pairs and eligibility vary by jurisdiction.

Major Centralized Exchanges (CEX)

STO is commonly available on:

• Binance
• Bybit
• OKX
• Gate

Storage Options After Purchase

• On an exchange account, which is custodial
• In any EVM wallet supporting the chain you hold STO on, using the address from the official documentation
• Behind a hardware wallet paired with an EVM wallet interface

Confirm the network before any deposit or withdrawal. STO exists on more than one chain.

Related Coins

• Lido DAO (LDO)
• ether.fi (ETHFI)
• Renzo (REZ)
• EigenLayer (EIGEN)
• Pendle (PENDLE)