The Ethereum Foundation has implemented a comprehensive restructuring, cutting its budget by 40% and laying off approximately 20% of its workforce as the organization enters its second decade. On June 23, the foundation announced the budget cut and confirmed the elimination of approximately 54 staff positions, with the move framed as a strategic pivot toward a leaner operation focused squarely on core protocol development. At least eight senior researchers left over the course of the year, with five of those exits happening in May alone. The leadership shakeups started months earlier, with co-executive director Tomasz Stańczak stepping down on February 13 and Hsiao-Wei Wang, part of the foundation's leadership team, departing in mid-June. Just one day before the restructuring announcement, a new independent research organization called EthLabs launched on June 22, as part of the foundation's strategy to further decentralize its role within the ecosystem. The restructuring also included the introduction of a new CROPS mandate and the spin-off of EthLabs, Ethereum Systems, and Ethereum Institutional as independent entities to further decentralize the foundation's role within the ecosystem.
Despite the organizational changes, the foundation converted 5,000 ETH into stablecoins in April to fund ongoing operations, with the stated goal of maintaining a treasury policy that covers approximately 2.5 years of expenses. The move represents a significant shift in how the foundation manages its cryptocurrency holdings, creating a more predictable funding mechanism for operational costs. This treasury management strategy reflects the foundation's commitment to maintaining financial stability while undergoing significant organizational changes. The conversion to stablecoins provides a more stable funding base compared to holding ETH directly, reducing volatility risks and ensuring consistent operational funding for the reduced workforce.
The Ethereum Foundation has appointed Pascal Coversacchio, co-founder of emergency crypto security service SEAL 911, to its board of directors as the fourth member, joining President Aya Miyaguchi, co-founder Vitalik Buterin, and Swiss lawyer Patrick Storchenegger. Coversacchio was appointed for an initial one-year term on a voluntary basis, with EF President Aya Miyaguchi stating that his security and privacy expertise is "not just technical — he's a living example of what 100 percent alignment with CROPS principles looks like." Coversacchio is known for authoring the "Ethereum Cypherpunk Manifesto" and serving on the advisory board of the Silviculture Society, created by the EF in February 2025. The appointment comes amid significant changes at the EF, which cut 20% of its staff in June 2026 and reorganized around five R&D units following departures at the executive director level and within the protocol team.
Cumulative inflows into US spot Ethereum ETFs have exceeded $11.23 billion, demonstrating strong institutional adoption of Ethereum as the network continues advancing its technology. Ethereum continued to attract participation from Wall Street institutions such as BlackRock and JPMorgan, with the momentum for Ethereum as an institutional base layer never stronger. Ethereum Institutional, the independent organization launched to drive institutional adoption of the ecosystem, has announced the close of its first funding round with undisclosed total amount raised. More than 100 organizations and individuals participated in the round, which was led by BitMine, SharpLink, and Ethereum co-founders Joe Lubin and Mihai Alisie. Participants include 21Shares, Aave, Circle, Curve Finance, Robinhood, Uniswap Labs, Securitize, and ENS Labs. The organization aims to create a single entry point for banks, asset managers, custodians, and sovereign institutions looking to work with Ethereum.
Despite internal changes, Ethereum's technical roadmap has continued moving forward with the activation of the Fusaka upgrade demonstrating that the network's development process remained resilient, according to CoinDesk reports. At the heart of the upgrade is PeerDAS, an advance in data availability designed to make layer-2s efficient, representing another important milestone in Ethereum's scaling strategy. The Pectra upgrade went live in May 2025, followed by Fusaka in December 2025. The next major upgrade, Glamsterdam, is targeted for the second half of 2026, with the foundation's focus on core values: censorship resistance, open source, privacy, and security becoming increasingly visible in institutional adoption efforts. The technical development continues to demonstrate Ethereum's ability to maintain its position as the world's second-largest blockchain despite organizational challenges.
As Ethereum enters its second decade, the story is no longer just about the network itself but also about the institution that has helped steward it since the beginning, according to CoinDesk analysis. For much of its first decade, Ethereum's challenge was proving that decentralized infrastructure could work, while its second decade begins with a different challenge: ensuring that the institutions surrounding that infrastructure can evolve without compromising the decentralized principles that made Ethereum possible in the first place. The timing is fitting as Ethereum has always championed decentralization at the protocol level, eliminating single points of failure through distributed consensus, and now that same principle is increasingly being applied to its institutions. The foundation's recent restructuring and the emergence of independent entities demonstrate this evolution in action, with the foundation's focus on core values: censorship resistance, open source, privacy, and security becoming increasingly visible in institutional adoption efforts.
