A Co-Founder Holds the Keys to $200 Million in Crypto, Sparking Governance Debate

The NEO project has been operating with an unconventional setup, where hundreds of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency have been controlled by personal wallets without multi-signature protections or formal oversight. According to co-founder Da Hongfei, the individual in control of these assets is Erik Zhang, the project's other co-founder and core protocol architect. Da estimates that Zhang holds between $200 million and $250 million worth of NEO and GAS tokens, exceeding the project's current market capitalization of $197 million. The two co-founders have been embroiled in a public dispute since December, with each presenting rival governance plans. Da's proposal, published on GitHub, calls for the Neo Foundation to be redomiciled in the Cayman Islands, the establishment of an independent five-member board, and the redistribution of approximately 26 million NEO and 40 million GAS tokens to tokenholders. In contrast, Zhang's counter-proposal suggests maintaining the current governance structure and keeping the Foundation in Singapore. Zhang's plan also includes a formal investigation into historical asset management, which Da has dismissed as an empty accusation. The dispute has led to a stalemate, with the project's treasury holding approximately $460 million in assets, roughly double its market value, and the token having dropped 98% from its 2018 peak. Da has proposed a mutual disarmament, where both he and Zhang would relinquish control over the assets, with NGD losing control over most of its assets, including bitcoin and stablecoins, and Zhang losing personal control over the majority of NEO tokens. However, the success of this proposal depends on Zhang's cooperation, and it remains uncertain whether he will agree to transfer the single-signature token holdings to a multi-signature lock address.