The co-founders of Opyn are resigning following regulatory action taken by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) against the DeFi options protocol in September.
Opyn’s CEO, Zubin Koticha, announced their departure from the crypto space in a post on X today. He pointed to the recent regulatory measures against Opyn as the reason for their decision.
In September, the CFTC filed and settled charges against Opyn, along with two other DeFi entities. Opyn faced allegations of registration failures, failure to implement a customer identification program, and the illegal offering of leveraged and margined retail commodity transactions in digital assets.
The CFTC imposed a $250,000 penalty on Opyn and mandated the cessation of violations of the Commodity Exchange Act and CFTC regulations.
Koticha expressed disappointment, stating, “We spent the last six years working on incredible stuff that would’ve never been possible in TradFi — cutting-edge work on the forefront of structured products and derivatives. We thought we were going to be in crypto for the rest of our lives. But, unfortunately, and unexpectedly, this is the end of the road.”
He also revealed that Andrew Leone, the head of research at Opyn, will assume the role of CEO. Leone, formerly a vice president at Nomura, the Japanese bank, where he led VIX and structured volatility trading, according to his LinkedIn profile.