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What is Renzo?

Renzo is a Liquid Restaking Token (LRT) protocol and strategy manager built on top of EigenLayer, Ethereum's restaking infrastructure. It was founded by Lucas Kozinski, Kratik Lodha, and James Poole, and launched its mainnet in late 2023 following EigenLayer's own rollout. The protocol abstracts away the technical complexity of restaking, allowing everyday users to deposit ETH or supported liquid staking tokens and receive ezETH, a liquid restaking token that represents their position and automatically accrues restaking rewards plus points from EigenLayer and Renzo itself.

By handling operator selection, Actively Validated Service (AVS) allocation, and reward optimization on behalf of depositors, Renzo positions itself as a set-and-forget gateway into the restaking economy. Renzo quickly became one of the largest LRT protocols by total value locked, competing with EtherFi, Kelp DAO, and Puffer Finance in a rapidly expanding category.

The protocol raised a $3.2 million seed round led by Maven 11 in early 2024, with participation from Figment Capital, SSV, IOSG, and Re7 Capital, among others. Binance Labs (now YZi Labs) subsequently made a strategic investment in Renzo, which helped elevate the protocol's profile across centralized exchange ecosystems. The REZ governance token launched in April 2024 through a Binance Launchpool, giving users the ability to farm REZ by staking BNB, FDUSD, or ezETH, and this listing drove massive initial liquidity and price discovery on major exchanges including Binance, Bybit, and Upbit.

The launch was not without controversy: Renzo's initial tokenomics disclosure drew criticism from the community after some users felt the circulating supply at launch was smaller than they had anticipated, prompting the team to clarify emission schedules and communicate more transparently about token unlocks. Shortly after the token generation event, ezETH briefly depegged on decentralized exchanges due to liquidity imbalances as airdrop recipients rushed to exit positions, forcing Renzo to adjust withdrawal mechanics and expand native redemption capabilities through its partnership with Connext (now Everclear) and LayerZero for cross-chain mint and burn functionality.

Renzo has since expanded multi-chain, making ezETH available on Ethereum, Arbitrum, Linea, Base, Mode, Blast, BNB Chain, and other networks, supported by deep integrations with DeFi protocols such as Pendle, Morpho, Balancer, Curve, Kamino, Aave-fork markets, and various restaking aggregators. The protocol has also rolled out pzETH for Symbiotic restaking, extending its strategy-manager thesis beyond EigenLayer to newer shared-security primitives.

Governance of the protocol is handled by REZ token holders via the Renzo DAO, which votes on parameters including AVS selection, operator whitelisting, fee structures, and treasury deployment. As the restaking narrative matures and AVS rewards begin to flow to restakers in earnest, Renzo's role as a curator of risk-adjusted restaking strategies has become a central part of its value proposition.

Key Features of Renzo

• Liquid Restaking With ezETH: Users deposit ETH, stETH, or wBETH and mint ezETH, a reward-bearing liquid token that represents their restaked position. ezETH remains transferable and usable across DeFi, so depositors keep liquidity while still earning EigenLayer restaking yield and Renzo points.
• Automated Strategy Manager: Renzo acts as a professional strategy manager on top of EigenLayer, selecting operators and allocating stake across approved AVSs to optimize risk-adjusted returns. This removes the need for users to research individual operators or rebalance their own exposure.
• Multi-Chain ezETH Availability: Through LayerZero-powered native minting and burning, ezETH is available on Ethereum, Arbitrum, Base, Linea, BNB Chain, Blast, Mode, and additional networks. This lets holders deploy ezETH into DeFi wherever liquidity and yields are deepest without bridging synthetic wrappers.
• REZ Governance Token: REZ holders govern the Renzo DAO, voting on AVS selection, operator whitelisting, fee parameters, and treasury spending. Governance power directly shapes how restaked ETH secures the broader Ethereum economic-security layer.
• Symbiotic Integration via pzETH: Renzo extended its strategy-manager model beyond EigenLayer by launching pzETH, a liquid restaking token for the Symbiotic protocol. This diversifies Renzo's product suite across multiple shared-security platforms and gives users exposure to emerging restaking ecosystems.

Renzo Use Cases

• Restake ETH Without Complexity: Users stake ETH or supported LSTs and receive ezETH in a single transaction, bypassing the need to run nodes, pick operators, or manage AVS allocations. It is the simplest path for retail users to access EigenLayer yield.
• DeFi Collateral and Yield Stacking: ezETH is widely accepted across Pendle, Morpho, Balancer, Curve, and lending markets, allowing holders to borrow against it, provide liquidity, or tokenize yield via Pendle PT/YT splits. This enables multi-layer yield strategies on top of base restaking rewards.
• Cross-Chain Yield Farming: Because ezETH is natively minted on Layer 2s such as Arbitrum, Base, Linea, and Mode, users can farm incentive programs and points campaigns on those chains while still accruing EigenLayer rewards. This is especially popular during new L2 liquidity-mining seasons.
• Governance Participation: REZ holders can vote on Renzo DAO proposals that determine which AVSs receive delegated stake, how fees are structured, and how the treasury is deployed. This gives tokenholders direct influence over a multi-billion-dollar restaking strategy.
• Institutional Restaking Access: Treasuries, DAOs, and funds can route ETH allocations through Renzo to gain diversified AVS exposure with professional risk management. The liquid nature of ezETH also means institutions can unwind positions via secondary markets without waiting for withdrawal queues.

Renzo Tokenomics

Total Supply

REZ has a maximum supply of 10,000,000,000 tokens. Allocations cover the community and airdrops, core contributors, investors, the Renzo Foundation, and ecosystem growth initiatives as described in the official Renzo tokenomics documentation.

Circulating

Circulating supply at token generation was about 1.15 billion REZ (about 11.5% of max supply), including 250 million REZ from the Binance Launchpool and the unlocked part of the Season 1 airdrop.

Utility

REZ is the governance token of the Renzo Protocol, used to vote on AVS selection, operator whitelisting, protocol fees, and treasury management. It does not directly accrue restaking yield, which is captured by ezETH holders, but it controls the parameters that shape those yields.

Emission

Investor and core-contributor allocations follow a multi-year vesting schedule with a cliff and linear unlocks, while community, airdrop, and ecosystem allocations are released progressively through incentive programs and seasons. Exact unlock dates are published by the Renzo team; check the official docs and Token Unlocks trackers for the current schedule.

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