SharpLink Gaming, a Nasdaq-listed entity that has rapidly transitioned into one of the world’s largest corporate holders of Ethereum, announced on January 8, 2026, that it has successfully deployed $170 million worth of ETH onto the Linea Layer 2 network. This strategic move, executed through a collaboration with Anchorage Digital Bank and EigenCloud, represents a significant milestone in the “institutionalization” of decentralized finance. By moving a portion of its massive treasury—which currently holds over 859,000 ETH—onto Linea’s zero-knowledge rollup architecture, SharpLink aims to capture enhanced yields that combine native Ethereum staking rewards with restaking incentives. Joseph Chalom, the Co-CEO of SharpLink, characterized the deployment as the beginning of Ethereum’s “productive era,” where public companies can finally manage digital asset treasuries with the same rigor and compliance as traditional capital.

Strategic Restaking and the Search for Institutional-Grade Yield

The $170 million deployment is specifically designed to utilize the burgeoning “restaking” ecosystem that has matured throughout late 2025. By leveraging Anchorage Digital as a qualified custodian, SharpLink is able to participate in EigenCloud’s restaking protocols, which provide additional yield in exchange for securing various decentralized services. This multi-layered yield strategy is expected to generate an annual return significantly higher than standard Layer 1 staking, with early estimates suggesting a combined yield of between 7% and 9%. This approach allows SharpLink to maximize its “ETH per share” accretion while maintaining a low-risk profile suitable for a publicly traded company. The choice of Linea as the primary execution environment highlights the network’s growing reputation as the “institutional layer” of Ethereum, offering the security of the mainnet with the speed and cost-efficiency required for large-scale treasury operations.

Validating the Corporate Ethereum Treasury Model in Twenty-Six

SharpLink’s aggressive move onto a Layer 2 network serves as a powerful validation of the “Ethereum-first” corporate strategy, which the company adopted in mid-2025. Unlike other firms that hold Bitcoin as a passive reserve, SharpLink views its ETH holdings as a productive asset that can be “put to work” within the global digital economy. This philosophy is supported by the recent passage of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, which has provided the legal framework necessary for U.S. corporations to engage in complex on-chain activities without fear of regulatory repricing. As the company continues to restake more of its $2.7 billion ETH position, it is setting a precedent for other institutional investors who have historically remained on the sidelines. If this model continues to deliver outsized returns for shareholders, analysts expect a “domino effect” where more Nasdaq-listed firms begin exploring high-performance Layer 2 networks to optimize their own cash reserves.