Ethena Foundation said on Aug. 27 that it has bought out all locked ENA tokens from major seed investors who sold any of the asset over the previous nine months, part of a four-part overhaul of the protocol’s ownership and token economics. The plan was laid out in an announcement from the Foundation and also hands the protocol’s intellectual property to the Foundation, opens a vote on a fee switch, and removes the monthly token-unlock schedule tied to venture investors.
What the buyout and restructuring cover
The buyout targets seed investors that sold ENA at any point in the past nine months, with the Foundation purchasing their remaining locked tokens instead of letting those positions continue to vest. In a separate Master Framework Agreement, the Foundation and Ethena Labs assigned the protocol’s intellectual property and all value it accrues exclusively to the Foundation, where token holders will govern it. Equity investors in the Labs entity receive no residual cash flow under the new structure, the Foundation said.
Fee switch and unlock changes
A governance proposal is now live to switch on a fee mechanism that would direct net revenue from every Ethena business line into programmatic buybacks of ENA. The Foundation and lead investors also agreed to release unvested tokens in order to remove the future overhang from monthly venture-capital unlocks, while team tokens stay locked under their original vesting schedules. The combined changes are designed to cut selling pressure and return value to the token rather than to early backers. The proposal’s exact parameters, including the share of revenue allocated to buybacks, were not detailed in the announcement.
Why it matters for ENA holders
The announcement follows a run of Ethena developments this summer, including a $1 billion secured facility with FalconX to back USDe and the addition of ENA reference rates on CME Group’s derivatives platform. ENA has traded in a wide range this summer, and the buyback mechanism is intended to ease that selling pressure over time. The buyout and fee switch still hinge on governance approval, and the Foundation has not disclosed how much ENA it purchased or the pace of any buyback program, so the near-term market impact remains uncertain.
