Another platform is shutting down in the cryptocurrency market. The latest news comes from the DeFi space.
The company that founded decentralized finance (DeFi) giant Balancer has announced its closure. Balancer co-founder Fernando Martinelli stated that Balancer Labs, the institutional organization that developed and funded the DeFi protocol, will be shutting down.
This decision comes approximately five months after a v2 vulnerability in November 2025 resulted in the theft of around $110 million worth of cryptocurrency (including osETH, WETH, and wstETH).
Martinelli stated, “The November 3, 2025 v2 attack created real and ongoing legal risks.” The co-founder emphasized that the v2 vulnerability attack led to ongoing legal risks and harmed the future development of the protocol because maintaining a corporate structure responsible for past security incidents became unsustainable without a revenue stream.
Martinelli stated, “BLabs, as a corporate entity, has become more of a liability than an asset for the future of the protocol, and without any revenue stream, it is not sustainable in its current form.”
However, Martinelli said the protocol would continue operating even after being restructured with a leaner economic model.
At this point, Martinelli added that he supports the ongoing token economic restructuring proposal, which includes reducing BAL emissions to zero, shutting down the BAL system, directing 100% of protocol fees to the DAO treasury, reducing the V3 protocol fee share to 25% to attract liquidity, and providing exit liquidity to holders through BAL buybacks.
*This is not investment advice.
