Danny Ryan is a researcher and developer best known for his pivotal role in coordinating Ethereum's transition to a Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism. After a seven-year tenure as a core researcher at the Ethereum Foundation, he co-founded Etherealize, a venture focused on integrating Ethereum's decentralized infrastructure with traditional financial markets. ^{[1] [2]}​

Career

Ethereum Foundation (c. 2017–2024)

Ryan joined the Ethereum Foundation around 2017 and became one of its most prominent researchers. His early work focused on educating the community about complex technical concepts for the network's future. Through a series of articles published on his Medium blog in 2017 and 2018, he explained the fundamentals of Proof-of-Stake (PoS), the Casper protocol, and sharding. ^[3] In a key post from June 2018, he outlined a roadmap that integrated the Casper protocol with Ethereum's sharding scaling solution, influencing the research and development direction of the network. ^[3] His role at the foundation evolved to protocol support lead, where he was responsible for leading developer calls and coordinating the various client teams working on Ethereum's core infrastructure. ^[4]​

Coordinating the Proof-of-Stake Transition

Ryan's most significant contribution at the Ethereum Foundation was his role as the lead coordinator for the multi-year effort to transition Ethereum from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake (PoS), a network upgrade commonly known as "The Merge." ^{[5] [6]} He led the research and development for the Beacon Chain, the PoS chain that would become the new consensus layer for Ethereum, and oversaw its launch in 2021. ^[2] His work was instrumental in harmonizing the efforts of multiple client development teams, a critical task for the success of the complex upgrade. ^[4]​

Ryan was a key public-facing figure for the upgrade, providing regular updates and authoring technical proposals. On November 4, 2020, he announced the release of the eth2 v1.0.0 specifications and the mainnet deposit contract, a major step toward initiating the PoS transition. ^[7] In July 2021, he highlighted the creation of the pull request for EIP-3675, the formal proposal to codify The Merge. ^[7] After a series of successful tests, including the Ropsten testnet merge in June 2022, the Ethereum mainnet successfully transitioned to Proof-of-Stake on September 15, 2022, an event Ryan commemorated with a simple message: "We did it." ^[7] The final major step of the initial transition was the Shapella upgrade on April 12, 2023, which enabled the withdrawal of staked ETH. Ryan celebrated the event, stating, "Proof-of-stake took a bit of time, but the loop is finally complete!" ^[7]​

Departure and Leadership Discussions

On September 13, 2024, Ryan announced he was stepping away from the Ethereum Foundation. He described the role as an "all-consuming experience" and stated he was ready to "relinquish" his duties to "come up for air." ^[2] He later clarified in a January 2025 post that his departure was due to "health issues and in an attempt to clear my head after working my ass off." ^{[7] [8]}​

In late 2024, following his departure, Ryan entered into discussions with Vitalik Buterin and other foundation members about potentially returning to the Ethereum Foundation in a leadership capacity. ^[1] This occurred amid community-led calls for a change in the foundation's leadership. In January 2025, developer Fabrice Cheng launched an unofficial, non-binding on-chain poll to gauge support for Ryan to become the head of the EF. ^[9] The poll saw participation from over 580 wallets holding more than 51,000 ETH (valued at approximately $160 million at the time), with 99% voting in favor of Ryan. ^{[9] [8]}​

Influential figures like Consensys CEO Joseph Lubin publicly endorsed Ryan, suggesting a co-leadership model. ^[8] Ryan acknowledged the dialogue with the EF but cautioned that some of the surrounding discourse was becoming "counterproductive" and that "vitriol is ultimately harmful to this process." ^[8] By January 2025, Ryan and the Ethereum Foundation "mutually parted ways" on the leadership discussions. [1]

Etherealize (2025–Present)

In March 2025, Ryan announced that he was joining as a co-founder of Etherealize, a new venture alongside Vivek Raman, a former executive from the traditional finance firm Citadel. ^{[4] [7]} The company's stated mission is to "onboard the world to Ethereum," with a specific focus on developing infrastructure and financial products that connect institutional finance and Wall Street with the Ethereum ecosystem. ^[1] Ryan described his role as serving as a "bi-directional" bridge, bringing his deep protocol context to the traditional finance world while translating institutional needs back to the Ethereum ecosystem. ^[1]​

On September 3, 2025, it was reported that Etherealize had raised $40 million in a funding round led by venture capital firms Paradigm and Electric Capital. ^{[10] [5]}​

Public Stances and Technical Contributions

Risks of Liquid Staking

Ryan is a vocal critic of the centralization risks posed by liquid staking protocols. In May 2022, he published an influential analysis titled "The Risks of LSD" (Liquid Staking Derivatives), warning against the systemic risks that would arise if a single staking provider were to control a significant share of staked ETH. ^[7] He has repeatedly argued that any entity or protocol exceeding key consensus thresholds, particularly one-third of the total stake, poses a threat to Ethereum's security, neutrality, and censorship resistance. ^[7]​

Advocacy for Decentralization

Throughout his career, Ryan has consistently advocated for decentralized principles. He has stated his core belief that "Open, neutral, decentralized infrastructure must be the foundation for the future of US and global economic activity." ^[7] He views the current moment as an existential one for Ethereum, arguing it is critical that a "truly open, decentralized, permissionless platform" is the one adopted by the world. ^[1]​

Interviews

Institutions and Decentralization #01

In an interview published on November 19, 2025, on the YouTube channel of the Ethereum Foundation, Danny Ryan discussed the relationship between Ethereum and institutional finance during Ethereum Day at Devconnect Argentina 2025.

Ryan describes institutional financial markets as fragmented systems characterized by multiple intermediaries, manual operational steps, and settlement delays. According to his account, these structural features contribute to higher operational costs and increased counterparty risk. He frames the growing institutional interest in decentralization as a response to these constraints, emphasizing requirements such as infrastructure neutrality, fault tolerance, and continuous availability rather than ideological alignment.

From Ryan perspective, Ethereum provides a technical environment aligned with institutional expectations due to its security assumptions, distributed client architecture, and established application and development tooling. He identifies privacy as a baseline condition for institutional participation, stating that financial entities operate under constraints that limit public exposure of transactional data. In this context, he references Ethereum research and implementation efforts related to applied cryptography and zero-knowledge proofs as relevant to meeting existing market privacy standards.

Ryan also addresses the role of liquidity and network effects in adoption decisions, noting that institutional capital typically concentrates in ecosystems where liquidity and integration already exist. He presents this dynamic as a factor influencing platform selection in institutional contexts. In addition, he distinguishes between symbolic asset tokenization and the development of systems that replicate financial functions with reduced settlement times, lower operational overhead, and closer alignment with regulatory and compliance processes.

The discussion also covers challenges associated with institutional engagement, including the potential impact of institutional participation on Ethereum governance and the difficulty of aligning technical terminology with established financial frameworks. Ryan concludes by outlining his view that Ethereum may function as a settlement and coordination layer for financial activity, supporting the gradual integration of real-world assets into onchain systems while maintaining decentralized operational characteristics. ^[13]