Ethereum Foundation Co-Executive Director Hsiao-Wei Wang Resigns

Wang says Ethereum is larger than any one role

Wang used her resignation message to emphasize Ethereum’s broader contributor base rather than her own position inside the Ethereum Foundation. “Ethereum has always been bigger than any one role, any one organization, or any one moment,” Wang said. She said Ethereum’s strength comes from people “who keep building permissionless infrastructure across the ecosystem to unlock freedoms that didn’t exist before.”

Wang said she was proud of work done “not only at the EF, but across the builders, researchers, educators, node operators, validators, users, and many other contributors” who helped build, maintain, and advance Ethereum. Her statement presented the protocol as a wider decentralized effort, even as her departure sharpened attention on leadership turnover inside the foundation.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin praised Wang’s decade-long role in the ecosystem and called her “a steadfast contributor.” Buterin said Wang put “a lot of work into building an excellent Ethereum community in Taipei, with people and events that were among my favorites.” His comments credited Wang not only for foundation work, but also for local ecosystem development.

Buterin also highlighted the difficulty of the leadership role Wang and Tomasz Stanczak accepted. “Last year she, along with @tkstanczak, voluntarily took on the burden of what is perhaps the most challenging position in the Ethereum Foundation, at one of the most challenging times for Ethereum — and realistically, a challenging time for all of humanity,” Buterin said.

Stanczak left his co-executive director role in February 2026 after helping steer a leadership transition at the Switzerland-based nonprofit. After his departure, Bastian Aue was named interim co-director alongside Wang. Aue’s role has drawn added attention because he helped guide the transition during Wang’s sabbatical and took on a larger interim position after both co-executive directors stepped away.

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Senior exits intensify governance scrutiny

Wang’s resignation came during a wider period of Ethereum Foundation turnover. At least eight senior figures left the organization over the previous five months, including top researcher Dankrad Feist, Stanczak and at least two veteran members of the foundation. The string of exits has fueled scrutiny of the foundation’s priorities, governance and strategic direction while Ethereum faces competition from rival blockchains.

Feist had separately raised concerns about the foundation before Buterin’s May mandate for a leaner organization. Feist argued that the Ethereum community should create a new organization with at least $1 billion in ETH funding to “save Ethereum.” “The community needs to create an organization that's economically aligned with Ethereum and accountable to it,” Feist said.

Feist also said the proposed organization needed “a leader who is competent and wants to fight.” His comments put the leadership question beyond a routine personnel reshuffle, pointing instead to concerns over whether the current structure is economically aligned with Ethereum and aggressive enough to support the ecosystem.

Buterin said about one month before Wang’s resignation that the Ethereum Foundation would become a “smaller ship.” The stated direction was for a leaner organization focused on censorship resistance, privacy and security. The foundation had also been making “large changes” since early 2025, with the goal of improving its relationship with ecosystem builders and active participants.

Those changes continued into 2026, when Buterin said Ethereum needed “new plans” for its relationship with layer-2 networks. The layer-2 issue was presented as part of the foundation’s broader strategic reset, alongside leadership changes, treasury reform and continued debate over how the Ethereum Foundation should coordinate with the wider ecosystem.

Treasury policy and ETH market context

The Ethereum Foundation has also faced criticism over ETH sales from its treasury. It recently introduced a more transparent treasury policy explaining when it would look to sell ETH. The policy said the foundation would seek to “earn acceptable returns on treasury assets,” signaling a more formal approach to managing treasury resources.

The foundation began staking its treasury earlier in 2026 and set an ultimate goal of staking around 70,000 ETH. That target was valued at roughly $119 million. The treasury update came as the foundation attempted to answer long-running community complaints over how it manages its ETH holdings.

COIN360 crypto price data showed ETH recently changing hands near $1,708, down about 1.4% over the previous 24 hours. ETH was also reported nearly 66% below its $4,946 all-time high, which was reached in August 2025.

A representative from the Ethereum Foundation did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Wang’s resignation was presented by Wang as a reflective personal transition, while the surrounding facts placed it within a broader pattern of foundation restructuring, senior departures, treasury changes and ongoing debate over Ethereum’s organizational direction.