Vitalik Buterin Says Ethereum Foundation Will Sell Less ETH, Focus on CROPS

Vitalik Buterin said the Ethereum Foundation will choose “longevity over breadth,” sell less ETH, and narrow its focus to CROPS: censorship/capture resistance, openness, privacy, and security.

“Buterin says Ethereum Foundation will shrink, sell less ETH, and focus on 'CROPS' Buterin's influence in the EF will decrease as the board expands”

@coindesk

In the same post, Buterin framed the EF as “one node, with a defined purpose, alongside other nodes,” rather than the center of Ethereum.

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Buterin tied the shift to a period of internal turbulence, saying the board is expanding while his own influence within the organization will continue to decrease, “which is honestly what I want.”

The Defiant reported ETH rose about 1.4% in the 24 hours after Buterin’s post, trading near $2,132 as of Monday, while total cryptocurrency capitalization was up 1.1% to roughly $2.67 trillion.

The Defiant also said the foundation now holds approximately 0.16% of total ETH supply, and that the EF will sell less ETH as part of the “smaller ship” plan.

Community reactions split between praise for the philosophical reset and concern about execution, with Anthony Sassano replying directly to Buterin and William Mougayar quote-tweeting: “a crystal clear message, and the road ahead is super clear. Ethereum is untouchable.”

Sassano’s framing of ETH as Ethereum’s highest-value “product” also drew support, while Suhail Kakar called the post “bullish” and said, “A foundation voluntarily shrinking its own power is the rarest thing in crypto. genuinely the most cypherpunk thing I’ve read in a long time.”

CryptoSlate

Not all replies were aligned, as Go-Ethereum developer Marius van der Wijden argued that “the security part is in my opinion the most important! Without a secure L1 none of this makes any sense.”

Laura Shin, host of Unchained, asked the governance question the post left open: “What’s the process for adding new members to the board?”

The Defiant added that leadership turmoil has continued, saying at least eight senior contributors departed in 2026, with five exits in May alone, including high-profile researchers.

Buterin said the EF will focus only on activities critical to Ethereum’s censorship resistance, openness, privacy, and security, and that “Yes, this means we sell less ETH.”

“Vitalik’s smaller Ethereum Foundation tests ETH holders’ demand for execution Vitalik Buterin says the Ethereum Foundation should shrink, sell less ETH, and leave asset promotion to outside groups while ETH holders demand stronger execution”

CryptoSlate

The Block reported that Buterin’s post landed amid departures, saying at least eight senior EF contributors have left or announced plans to leave in 2026, including five in May, and that Stanczak separately stepped down as co-executive director.

The Block also described the EF’s technical priorities as “provably bug-free Ethereum” via AI-assisted formal verification, “available chain consensus,” and intermediary minimization through FOCIL, EIP-8141, and the EF’s Kohaku wallet framework.

Decrypt reported that Buterin said the Ethereum Foundation currently controls around 0.16% of Ethereum’s total supply, a sum valued at $408 million, and that he disclosed around 90% of his net worth remains tied up in ETH.

In the same thread, Buterin warned against relying on social consensus and hard forks to rescue Ethereum from nodes going offline, writing, “It's not OK for bitcoin or ethereum or eg. zcash.”