Stake tokens

Resources: Staking

This section is part of a series on the topic of Staking.

Docs:

• Intro to staking on Vega
• Tutorial: Stake via APIs and smart contracts

Tools:

• Associate tokens, nominate validators on the governance dApp ↗

tip

This tutorial describes how to stake using the smart contracts, the APIs, an Ethereum wallet, and a Vega Wallet. If you're looking for the easiest way to stake tokens, visit governance.fairground.wtf ↗

• Tokenholders can stake tokens to validators on the Vega chain, also known as nominating validators.
• A Vega Wallet is required to create a Vega key and to stake (also known as nominate) validators.
• Vega tokens may be locked in a vesting schedule. This tutorial covers unlocked tokens, i.e. tokens that are in a user's Ethereum wallet.
• The staking bridge used to stake assets is different to the ERC20 bridge that allows asset withdrawal.

Staking unlocked tokens

Staking tokens from a tokenholder's Ethereum wallet follows the below process:

1. On Ethereum, the tokens need to be associated with a Vega key
2. On Vega, the Vega key is used to nominate a validator (stake)
3. At the end of each epoch, rewards are paid out to the Vega key

Withdrawing unlocked and unassociated tokens

1. On Vega, rewards and unassociated tokens can be withdrawn by submitting a withdrawal transaction
2. On Ethereum, the withdrawal confirmation is submitted to the staking bridge, and the rewards are released to the specified Ethereum address

Staking unlocked tokens: step by step

1. Associating tokens

Tokens are associated by calling stake on the Vega staking bridge. The two parameters are:

• vega_public_key - the Vega public key that will be used to nominate validators on Vega
• amount - the amount of tokens being associated with the Vega key

It will take ~50 block confirmations for the balance to update. You can see when the staking balance has been credited by using REST or gRPC.

2. Nominating a validator

Once the token balance is associated to a Vega key, you'll want to choose a validator or validators to nominate.

Fetch a list of validator nodes using REST.

Nominate a validator by sending a transaction with the Vega Wallet:

Command line (Linux / OSX)

vegawallet transaction send --wallet "WALLET_NAME" --pubkey "VEGA_PUBKEY" --network fairground '{
  "delegateSubmission": {
    "nodeId":"INSERT_NODE_ID_FOR_NOMINATION",
    "amount":"1000000000000000000"
   }
}'

Command line (Windows)

vegawallet.exe transaction send --wallet "WALLET_NAME" --pubkey "VEGA_PUBKEY" --network fairground ^
"{\"delegateSubmission\": ^
    { ^
        \"nodeId\":\"INSERT_NODE_ID_FOR_NOMINATION", ^
        \"amount\":\"1000000000000000000\" ^
    } ^
}"

3. Claiming rewards

A nomination to a validator occurs in one epoch, and takes effect in the subsequent epoch.

That means that during the first epoch in which you nominate, no rewards will be received. For each subsequent epoch, rewards will be deposited to the Vega key, in the form of VEGA tokens. (Once trading is available on mainnet, rewards will be paid in a mix of VEGA tokens and settlement asset tokens.)

Specific reward payouts can be queried via REST.

After VEGA rewards have been credited to the Vega key they can used to nominate validators or withdrawn.

Withdrawing involves preparing a withdrawal request, which the validators will confirm and sign in order for you to be able to request the withdrawal on Ethereum. The funds will immediately be locked on Vega, so they can be withdrawn through the Ethereum bridge.

Withdrawing unlocked tokens: step by step

1. Getting multisig bundle for withdrawal

Your withdrawal should be confirmed within a few seconds.

You can retrieve the signature bundle, which you will submit to the ERC20 bridge in the next step, by using REST.

2. Submitting withdrawal to Ethereum

With the signature bundle fetched above, the final step is to submit that withdrawal to the staking bridge. This can be done via the withdraw_asset function on the Ethereum bridge.

• amount - the amount of Vega being withdrawn
• asset_source - the contract address of the asset being withdrawn
• target - the Ethereum address to receive the rewards
• nonce - the nonce from step 4
• signatures - signature bundle from step 4

Ethereum addresses

Name	Address	Ethereum network
ERC20 Bridge	0x7fe27d970bc8Afc3B11Cc8d9737bfB66B1efd799 🔍	sepolia
Staking bridge	0xFFb0A0d4806502ceF491aF1141f66669A1Bd0D03 🔍	sepolia
Token vesting	0x680fF88252FA7071CAce7398e77872d54D781d0B 🔍	sepolia
Vega token	0xdf1B0F223cb8c7aB3Ef8469e529fe81E73089BD9 🔍	sepolia