Why the Ethereum Foundation Is Suddenly Again at the Center of Crypto’s Culture War
Nine departures, a leaked mandate, a $1 billion proposal, and a community divided. Here’s what’s actually happening at the Ethereum Foundation, and why it matters for your ETH.
You might have noticed something strange lately.
Every time you open Crypto Twitter (sorry, X), someone’s arguing about the Ethereum Foundation. Not about scalability. Not about gas fees. About the Foundation itself.
Its direction. Its spending. Its soul.
And here’s the thing: these aren’t just bored degens looking for drama. The people firing shots include former EF researchers, prominent crypto journalists, and even Vitalik Buterin himself.
Something is shifting. And whether you hold 0.1 ETH or 1,000, you need to understand what’s happening. Because the Foundation’s evolution doesn’t just affect Ethereum’s roadmap. It affects ETH’s market positioning, its competitive standing against Solana, and arguably its survival as the world’s leading smart contract platform.
So let’s break it all down. No alarmist hype. No blind cheerleading. Just the facts, the debates, and what they actually mean for you.
The Exodus by the Numbers: Nine Departures and Counting
Let’s start with the data point that triggered everything.
At least nine senior Ethereum Foundation members have left or announced departures in 2026.
Five of those exits happened in May alone.
Here’s the list that matters:
- Tomasz Stańczak — Co-executive director, stepped down in February after less than a year in the role to focus on AI initiatives
- Josh Stark — Operations lead and key figure in multiple major upgrades (The Merge, Dencun, Fusaka, Pectra), departed in April
- Trent Van Epps — Protocol Guild founder, departed alongside Stark in April
- Alex Stokes — Co-head of Protocol Research, on sabbatical
- Barnabé Monnot — Protocol Guild co-lead, departed May 12
- Tim Beiko — Protocol Guild co-lead, departed May 12
- Carl Beek — Seven-year researcher, Beacon Chain contributor, departed May 19
- Julian Ma — Four-year researcher, FOCIL (EIP-7805) co-author, departed May 19
- Dankrad Feist — Cryptographer behind Danksharding, left full-time role in 2025
Now, before you panic: not everyone reads this as a crisis.
Long-time Ethereum community figure Ryan Berckmans pushed back hard against the doomsday narrative. His argument? The departures reflect internal disagreements over sub-strategies — not a loss of faith in Ethereum itself. Plus, he points to a deliberate generational shift underway.
Some staff disagreed with specific decisions. A small number were asked to leave. Others are part of a natural transition. — Ryan Berckmans paraphrased
Vitalik himself framed the exodus as evidence the new mandate is working as intended, not evidence of governance failure.
Still. When nine senior people walk out the door in six months, including five in a single month, something is clearly happening. And that something starts with a 38-page document.
Inside the EF Mandate: “One of Many Guardians”
In March 2026, the Ethereum Foundation released a 38-page mission statement.
It reaffirmed Ethereum’s core vision. But it also did something that genuinely surprised the community.
The Foundation explicitly stated that its role had shifted from “first guardian” to “one of many guardians.”
That’s not just corporate jargon. That’s a fundamental repositioning. For nearly a decade, the EF acted as Ethereum’s default central coordinator. Now it’s saying: we’re stepping back.
The mandate also spelled out what the EF does prioritize: preserving core values like censorship resistance, open source development, privacy, and security, values the Foundation branded as CROPS (Censorship-resistant, open source, private, and secure).
Notice what’s not in that list.
Growth. Market competitiveness. ETH price appreciation.
Those are conspicuously absent.
Critics argue the mandate signals the Foundation intends to take a backseat just as institutional interest in blockchain is accelerating — raising concerns that Ethereum may need stronger coordination to compete with rival networks.
“The EF is completely out of touch. They’re funding hippos in Asia and doing a bunch of stuff nobody in the world gives a s** about other than Vitalik and his little cabal.”*, Zak Cole, longtime Ethereum contributor
Ouch.
But here’s the irony: the mandate also included one of the most crypto-native flexes imaginable. To demonstrate its resolve, the EF created a meme titled “SOURCE SEPPUKU LICENSE,” implying that if it failed to uphold its commitments to Ethereum, it would “face the consequences and take responsibility.”
You can’t make this stuff up.
The Culture War: Price Pumpers vs. Cypherpunks
This is where the debate gets philosophical. And honestly? It’s the most interesting part.
You have two camps forming inside the Ethereum community.
Camp A: The Price-Focused Pragmatists
These folks argue that Ethereum is losing the narrative, and the market cap race, because the EF refuses to advocate for ETH as an asset. Solana has outperformed Ethereum in recent cycles. Layer-2 fragmentation has confused users. And the EF’s academic, cypherpunk posture isn’t winning hearts and minds.
Laura Shin, the crypto journalist, put it bluntly: she argued the EF’s focus on cheaper transactions after the Dencun upgrade undermined Ethereum’s economic narrative. “Ethereum’s main mistake was failing to consider each move after Dencun through the lens of tokenomics,” she said, adding that the shift diverted from the “ultrasound money” thesis that had attracted investors.
Camp B: The Cypherpunk Purists
These folks say: that’s exactly the point.
Ethereum was never supposed to be about number-go-up. It was about building a censorship-resistant, permissionless, open financial system that couldn’t be shut down. The moment the Foundation starts obsessing over ETH price, it compromises its neutrality and its mission.
Vitalik seems to land firmly in this camp, though maybe more nuanced than you’d expect.
“Being as fast and as scalable as possible, and only a small epsilon more decentralized than the others, is a route to mediocrity, and if we try it we will lose.” — Vitalik Buterin
Translation: chasing Solana’s speed while offering only marginally better decentralization is a losing strategy. Ethereum’s real value proposition is uncompromising decentralization, privacy, and resilience, even if that means slower transaction speeds.
But here’s the tension that keeps this debate alive: ETH is trading around $2,100 as of May 2026, with a market cap of roughly $258 billion, trailing both Bitcoin and Solana in recent performance.
When your token is underperforming, the “price doesn’t matter” argument gets harder to sell.
Vitalik Responds: Smaller EF, Less ETH Sold
On May 24, 2026, Vitalik Buterin published a roughly 1,500-word post on X addressing the turbulence.
He started by clarifying that this was his personal view, not an official board position. Then he got specific.
Three major announcements:
The EF will become smaller. Vitalik said his own influence within the organization will continue to shrink, and he described that outcome as intentional and welcome.
The EF will sell less ETH. Going forward, the Foundation will pursue what he called “longevity over breadth,” focusing resources on activities critical to Ethereum’s resilience that wouldn’t otherwise happen.
The EF is just “one node with a defined purpose.” Vitalik reminded everyone that the Foundation was originally chartered to complete work outlined in Ethereum’s pre-launch documents, and that task was finished in 2022. It’s not a central authority over the ecosystem.
He also addressed ETH as a financial asset directly, calling it Ethereum’s “most high-value product financially speaking” and noting that the EF has been actively considering how to support it, just not at the expense of core principles.
Technical priorities for the next phase:
- Formally verified, provably bug-free code using AI-assisted verification (something he called “nearly impossible to apply at this scale until roughly six months ago”)
- “Available chain consensus”, a design making Ethereum uniquely resistant to network disruptions
- Reducing intermediary dependence through FOCIL, EIP-8141, EIP-7701, and the Kohaku wallet framework
So: smaller footprint, less selling, deeper tech.
Whether that satisfies the price-focused camp… well, probably not.
Treasury in Turmoil: Staking, Unstaking, and Transparency
You can’t talk about the EF’s drama without talking about money.
The Ethereum Foundation holds roughly 0.16% of all ETH. That’s a tiny fraction compared to the 10% to 50% share common at other blockchain foundations, and Vitalik has framed this as a feature, not a bug.
But the treasury strategy has been… let’s call it evolving.
The shift to staking: In 2026, the EF staked nearly 70,000 ETH (roughly $143 million) into Beacon Chain validators, generating annual yields estimated at $3.9 million to $5.4 million.
The new treasury policy: Caps annual spending at 15% of assets, mandates a 2.5-year operational reserve, and commits to quarterly financial reports plus annual public reports.
The transparency debate: This is where things get thorny. Critics point out that the EF now employs researchers who shape monetary policy EIPs (like issuance rates) while simultaneously funding its operating budget from staking yields, a structure that creates, at minimum, the appearance of a conflict of interest.
The Foundation occupies a unique position no other staker matches: it employs the researchers who draft monetary-policy EIPs, runs a grants apparatus funding client teams, and holds informal convening power over All Core Devs calls. — AInvest analysis
The community’s transparency demands aren’t just FUD. They’re structural questions about who guards the guardians when the guardians profit from the rules they write.
The unsettling moves: In April, the EF withdrew 17,000 ETH from staking and reportedly sold 10,000 ETH OTC to Bitmine. Then, on May 12, it withdrew another 21,270 ETH (roughly $50 million) from Lido’s liquid staking protocol.
The Foundation hasn’t confirmed whether those unstaked funds will hit the open market. But the optics… aren’t great. Especially when you’ve just promised to “sell less ETH.”
The $1B Question: Does Ethereum Need a New Org?
This is where the story gets genuinely radical.
Former EF researcher Dankrad Feist (the cryptographer behind Danksharding) published what many are treating as a blueprint for institutional change.
His proposal: Create a new organization with at least $1 billion in starting capital, led by someone willing to fight for Ethereum’s competitive position, with an accountable board whose charter is oriented toward ETH’s success, and permanent funding routed through staking revenue.
“The EF now holds less than 0.1% of all ETH. There is no flow of Ethereum staking or fee revenues to it. Find a leader who is competent and wants to fight, make it accountable: a board of people who want ETH to go up, and a charter that holds the org accountable to it.” — Dankrad Feist
Ryan Sean Adams, Bankless co-founder and crypto investor, echoed the call immediately:
“It’s clear the future of Ethereum can’t depend on the EF. We need an org that wants ETH the asset to win, number go up. And gets loud. And executes hard. The EF is not that, never will be.”
Feist acknowledged the proposal would be “very hard to imagine now”, but added: “I think this is the only way.”
The counterpoint: The EF now has new leadership under Co-Executive Directors Bastian Aue and Hsiao-Wei Wang, who joined in February. Aue has focused on organizational coordination and operational optimization; Wang has been deeply involved in treasury policy and DeFi alignment.
And EF’s Jason Chaskin defended the nonprofit’s protocol focus, arguing that a price-first mandate would compromise Ethereum’s neutrality and long-term resilience.
But the fact that this conversation is happening at all, a serious proposal to raise $1 billion for a competitive Ethereum advocacy organization, tells you how much the ground has shifted.
Beyond the Drama: What’s Actually Next for Ethereum
Alright. Enough with the politics. What does all of this mean for Ethereum’s technology and roadmap?
The upgrades are still coming.
- Glamsterdam (delayed to Q3 2026) will deliver ePBS, block access lists for parallel execution, and blob fee repricing, aiming to push gas limits toward 100 million
- Hegotá (H2 2026) advances native account abstraction, making smart contract wallets the default without requiring bundlers or gas overhead
The EF doubled down on ZK and cryptography in Q1 2026 grants. Funding targeted zero-knowledge proofs, core clients (Geth, Erigon, Lighthouse), validator security tools, and quantum-resistant schemes.
L1 is back. After years of “L2 is the answer,” the EF’s 2026 Protocol Priorities Update re-centered L1 performance, security, and user experience alongside the Layer 2 ecosystem, not behind it.
The EF committed to DeFi, but on its own terms. In February, the Foundation published “The EF’s Commitment to DeFi,” advocating for what it called “Defipunk”: permissionless, censorship-resistant, privacy-first, self-custodial, and open source DeFi.
So the technology is advancing. The roadmap is clear. The upgrades are in testing.
The uncertainty isn’t about can Ethereum execute. It’s about who coordinates it when the EF is deliberately shrinking and decentralizing its own authority.
Is the EF’s Evolution a Bug or a Feature?
Here’s where I land after looking at all the pieces.
The Ethereum Foundation is facing the inevitable identity crisis of any successful decentralized project. When you’re a scrappy startup, central coordination works. When you’re securing trillions in assets and aspiring to be global financial infrastructure, “who’s in charge?” becomes an uncomfortable but necessary question.
The EF’s answer, “nobody, really, and we’re stepping back further”, is philosophically consistent with Ethereum’s founding ethos.
But is it practically sufficient for a competitive landscape where Solana is moving fast, institutional capital is flowing into crypto, and users don’t care about your ideology as much as they care about whether their transactions clear quickly and their tokens go up?
That’s the real debate. And honestly? Both sides have valid points.
The price-focused camp is right that Ethereum’s market positioning has suffered. The cypherpunk camp is right that compromising decentralization for speed is a race to the bottom.
The answer probably isn’t “burn the EF.” It’s also not “let the EF stay exactly as it is.”
What’s actually happening, whether by design or by accident, is a gradual, messy, occasionally painful transfer of authority from a single institution to a wider ecosystem of client teams, Layer 2 networks, DeFi protocols, and community organizations.
That transfer was always going to be messy. Decentralization isn’t tidy. You don’t get the benefits without the chaos.
So if you’re an Ethereum holder or builder, here’s my takeaway: don’t panic about the headlines. Watch the technology. Watch where the grants flow. Watch which L2s and DeFi protocols actually ship.
The EF’s drama is real. But Ethereum is bigger than any single institution, including the one that built it.
And maybe that’s exactly the point.
What do you think? Does Ethereum need a price-focused advocacy org to compete, or should the EF stay true to its cypherpunk roots? Drop your take in the comments.
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