stETH entered a critical phase on July 27-28, 2026, as Lido Finance initiated its largest protocol upgrade since 2023. The rollout of Curated Module v2 represents a watershed moment for the liquid staking protocol, consolidating more than 8 million stETH—roughly $16.5 billion in value—onto Ethereum's post-Pectra 0x02 validator design. The upgrade is designed to cut Ethereum's total validator count by approximately one-third and significantly reduce attestation load on the network, while introducing operator ETH bond requirements for the first time.