A $200 Million Crypto Project's Fate Hangs in the Balance as Co-Founders Clash

For years, the NEO project's treasury has been managed in an unconventional manner, with hundreds of millions of dollars in crypto assets controlled by personal wallets lacking multisig protection and formal oversight. According to co-founder Da Hongfei, approximately 85% of the project's assets are controlled by Erik Zhang, the other co-founder, with a single signature. The native NEO and GAS tokens held by Zhang are currently valued between $200 million and $250 million, 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 proposing 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 advocates for maintaining the current governance structure, with him remaining on the board, and includes provisions for a formal investigation into historical asset management. Da has dismissed these provisions as baseless accusations, stating that there has been no corruption or misuse of funds. The project's treasury holds approximately $460 million in assets, roughly double its market value, while the token has plummeted 98% from its 2018 peak. The treasury is split between two entities: the native NEO and GAS tokens, largely controlled by Zhang, and the non-token assets, including bitcoin, ether, stablecoins, and venture investments, managed by NGD, the entity run by Da. Da has framed his proposal as a form of mutual disarmament, where both he and Zhang would relinquish their individual control over the assets. However, the success of this proposal depends on Zhang's cooperation, and it remains unclear what will happen if he refuses to transfer the single-signature token holdings to a multisig lock address.