Registering Your Stake Address

Pledge is the stake that you delegate to your own pool. Using a transaction, you must register on the blockchain the stake address associated with a payment address containing funds that you want to pledge.

For a general discussion on creating transactions, see the topic Building and Signing Transactions.

To register a stake address on the blockchain:

Create a certificate, stake.cert, using the stake.vkey

air-gapped offline machine

cardano-cli conway stake-address registration-certificate \
    --stake-verification-key-file stake.vkey \
	--key-reg-deposit-amt 2000000 \
    --out-file stake.cert

Copy stake.cert to your hot environment.

You need to find the tip of the blockchain to set the invalid-hereafter parameter properly.

block producer node

currentSlot=$(cardano-cli conway query tip --mainnet | jq -r '.slot')
echo Current Slot: $currentSlot

Retrieve the UTXOs available for your payment address and calculate the balance.

block producer node

# Retrieve the list of UTXOs available for your payment address
utxo_json=$(cardano-cli conway query utxo --address $(cat payment.addr) --mainnet)

# Initialize variables
tx_in=""
total_balance=0
txcnt=0

# Loop through the list of UTXOs
while read -r utxo; do
    # Retrieve the values for the current UTXO
    values=$(jq -r --arg k "${utxo}" '.[$k]' <<< "${utxo_json}")
    # Retrieve datum associated with the UTXO
    datum=$(jq -r '.datum' <<< "${values}")
    # Retrieve the reference script associated with the UTXO
    script=$(jq -r '.referenceScript' <<< "${values}")
	# If limits on spending the UTXO may exist, then skip the UTXO
    if [[ ${datum} == 'null' && ${script} == 'null' ]]
    then
        hash=${utxo%%#*}
        idx=${utxo#*#}
        utxo_balance=$(jq -r '.value.lovelace' <<< "${values}")
        total_balance=$((${total_balance}+${utxo_balance}))
        echo "TxHash: ${hash}#${idx}"
        echo "ADA: ${utxo_balance}"
        tx_in="${tx_in} --tx-in ${hash}#${idx}"
		txcnt=$((txcnt + 1))
    fi
done <<< "$(jq -r 'keys[]' <<< "${utxo_json}")"

echo
echo "Total available ADA balance: ${total_balance}"
echo "Number of UTXOs: ${txcnt}"
echo "Final --tx-in string:${tx_in}"

Find the amount of the deposit required to register a stake address.

block producer node

stakeAddressDeposit=$(cat $NODE_HOME/params.json | jq -r '.stakeAddressDeposit')
echo stakeAddressDeposit : ${stakeAddressDeposit}

Registering a stake address requires a deposit of 2000000 lovelace.

Run the build-raw transaction command

The invalid-hereafter value must be greater than the current tip. In this example, we use current slot + 10000.

block producer node

cardano-cli conway transaction build-raw \
    ${tx_in} \
    --tx-out $(cat payment.addr)+$(( ${total_balance} - ${stakeAddressDeposit} )) \
    --invalid-hereafter $(( ${currentSlot} + 10000 )) \
    --fee 200000 \
    --out-file tx.tmp \
    --certificate stake.cert

Calculate the current minimum fee:

block producer node

fee=$(cardano-cli conway transaction calculate-min-fee \
    --tx-body-file tx.tmp \
    --tx-in-count ${txcnt} \
    --tx-out-count 1 \
    --mainnet \
    --witness-count 2 \
    --byron-witness-count 0 \
    --protocol-params-file params.json | jq -r '.fee')
echo fee: $fee

When calculating the fee for a transaction, the --witness-count option indicates the number of keys signing the transaction. You must sign a transaction submitting a stake address registration certificate to the blockchain using the secret—private—key for the payment address spending the input, as well as the secret key for the stake address to register.

When creating the transaction, ensure that the funds the input contains are greater than the total of the transaction fee and stake address deposit. If funds are insufficient, then the transaction fails.

Calculate your change output.

block producer node

txOut=$((${total_balance}-${stakeAddressDeposit}-${fee}))
echo Change Output: ${txOut}

Build your transaction which will register your stake address.

block producer node

cardano-cli conway transaction build-raw \
    ${tx_in} \
    --tx-out $(cat payment.addr)+${txOut} \
    --invalid-hereafter $(( ${currentSlot} + 10000 )) \
    --fee ${fee} \
    --certificate-file stake.cert \
    --out-file tx.raw

Copy tx.raw to your cold environment.

Sign the transaction with both the payment and stake secret keys.

air-gapped offline machine

cardano-cli conway transaction sign \
    --tx-body-file tx.raw \
    --signing-key-file payment.skey \
    --signing-key-file stake.skey \
    --mainnet \
    --out-file tx.signed

Copy tx.signed to your hot environment.

Send the signed transaction.

block producer node

cardano-cli conway transaction submit \
    --tx-file tx.signed \
    --mainnet