Proof of Stake

The failures of a centralized "consensus" mechanism

Proof-of-stake is no alternative to proof-of-work. When deployed, proof-of-stake will run into failures in the long run, because it has fundamentally flaws that can not be addressed without proof-of-work.

The fundamental flaws are:

  • No trustless mechanism for decentralized timestamping
  • No objective truth
  • No link to reality
  • No true randomness
  • No truly fair validator selection
  • No validator turnover
  • No way to bootstrap & fairly distribute coins
  • No real-world external cost
  • No game-theoretic stability in an adversarial environment
  • No way to reduce imbalance over time; rich get richer
  • No aligned incentives


Read the following to understand why proof-of-stake has and will always fail:

If you are more on the academic side of things, here are some papers:


Some recent failures include:

For some not-so-recent failures, see this thread by Alex B.



Visit endthefud.org/PoS for a collection of articles that explain why proof-of-stake is a non-solution to the problems that Bitcoin solves. Also make sure to browse the rekt leaderboard to get an idea of the amount of value destroyed and stolen by those who peddle bad ideas.


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