Vitalik Buterin pushes Ethereum Foundation toward AI-verified code

Vitalik Buterin has made clear his view of the current transition process the Ethereum Foundation (EF) is undergoing, which aims to adopt strategies to increase longevity, specialization, and expertise in technical matters.

In a lengthy post on X, the Ethereum co-founder elaborated that the EF is not focusing on its broad coordinating role. Instead, it is becoming a specialized node in the wider Ethereum ecosystem.

This aligns with ensuring the organization focuses on functions critical to the sustainability of Ethereum as a censorship-resistant, privately secure, open, and private technology—a concept abbreviated as CROPS—which can benefit from AI formal verification technology.

Vitalik Buterin stands ground on EF’s evolving role in the crypto market

To start off, Buterin has clarified that the perspectives stated were his own contributions on technical matters and did not reflect a board-level directive. Currently, the foundation board is growing significantly, especially under the leadership of @aerugoettinea, and Buterin was deliberately reducing his involvement in running the foundation as it was now in his best interests.

He further stated that 2025 had been quite a successful year, with increased competence, efficiency, and a focus on realistic objectives that solved several operational challenges faced by the foundation earlier.

Comparing Google’s early motto of “don’t be evil” to Buterin’s emphasis on the need for some organizations within the sector to resist the general trend of greed and fast-paced superintelligence.

Buterin reiterated that the foundation was just another node and not a central authority like Ethereum. It was consistent with its original objective during the token sale era, which was completed with the help of the Serenity upgrade.

Fiscal responsibility is at the heart of the pivot. At present, the EF owns only about 0.16% of the total ETH in circulation—significantly less than even some individuals or corporations—and is certainly not set up to be an everlasting guardian of the entire ecosystem.

To maximize effectiveness, it will focus on longevity rather than breadth, meaning it will sell less ETH.

Vitalik boosts EF’s technical vision, taking on CROPS

Buterin’s vision starts and ends with the need for Ethereum to be “deeply impressive” within CROPS, not speed alone, which would simply make it mediocre. He flat-out rejects 250ms latency and 1 million TPS as a recipe for failure, as it would render Ethereum no more decentralized than its competitors.

Instead, the team will aim to achieve three key objectives with respect to technology, all of which can be done with the aid of high-throughput and scalable L2 systems:

Provably bug-free software via AI-assisted formal verification: What was once deemed to be an impossibility for cybersecurity researchers is now possible within the last few months, all because of AI innovations. The EF’s goal is to make Ethereum one of the frontrunners in having bug-free code.

Available chain consensus: Ethereum, on the other hand, provides BFT security in an asynchronous setting, coupled with Bitcoin-like security in a synchronous setting (up to 49% Byzantines). Buterin pointed out that he had always been averse to using social consensus or hard fork as a solution to even 34% Byzantine failure.

Intermediary minimization: Current efforts related to FOCIL, EIP-8141, EIP-7701, and other projects aim to address the need for intermediaries to include transactions on Ethereum. This will be especially helpful for smart contract wallets, privacy-oriented systems such as Railgun, and higher-level applications like Kohaku.

The broader implications for ETH and its ecosystem 

Buterin highlighted that about $250 billion in ETH was secured on Ethereum, which remained the single most significant financial asset. About 90% of his net worth was invested in ETH, while the rest was invested in open-source biology, software, and hardware development projects.

Nevertheless, some of the market-related responsibilities pertaining to the ETH coin lay outside the ambit of EF’s new focus area. Buterin encouraged “other heroes” – including organizations that held more ETH than the Foundation – to take responsibility, with the latter willing to provide any necessary support initially.

Through this model, it would be ensured that Ethereum remained decentralized, with the EF preserving the integrity of the blockchain and others promoting ETH as the market leader.

This will be hard to achieve. As reported by Cryptopolitan, EF appears to be experiencing a major talent exodus, with at least six individuals already leaving or going on leave since April and May 2026 alone.

Among recent departures are Carl Beek and Julian Ma, two of EF’s leading researchers, who stepped down on May 18.

Seven-year veteran Carl Beek, who was among those who helped create the Beacon Chain and perform the KZG ceremony, confirmed that May 29 will be his last working day. Four-year-old cryptoeconomics researcher Julian Ma said he was leaving, expressing gratitude for cooperation in some important projects.

The smartest crypto minds already read our newsletter. Want in? Join them.