Andre Cronje and Anton Nell have been significant players in the crypto space especially with their role spearheading projects at Yearn.Finance. Anyone familiar with cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology is familiar with the Yearn.Finance, which is also the brain child of Andre Cronje. The Dutch crypto expert and developer created Yearn during his free time while being the head of technology at various companies.
Cronje and Nell’s exit from the crypt space was a shock to many. The announcement of their departure was even more shocking when Nell also announced that about 25 services and apps that they were involved in would be terminating on the 3rd of April 2022. The announcement, which was published in Rekt.news, listed apps and services including Fantom, SpookySwap, Solidy, Geist and Abacadabra as being amongst the projects that would be terminated. The article, however, was deleted.
The announcement sent ripples throughout the crypto space with many speculating on the future of Yearn.Finance and other Fantom Foundation projects that the duo was involved in. The uncertainty that the announcement caused was evident in how quickly the cryptocurrencies Fantom (FTM) and Yearn.Finance (YFI) tanked in value. YFI value plunged by 13% and FTM’s value fell by 15% in the first 24 hours following the announcement.
Were Anton and Andre Key to the Fantom Foundation and Yearn.Finance?
The article that caused panic was later pulled down. However, there is still a lot of speculation around the future of the projects that Cronje and Nell were involved in. So much so that the Fantom Foundation was forced to issue a statement to clarify the role that the two played and how their departure would affect the projects.
According to the statement issued by the Fantom Foundation, the Rekt piece was full of inaccurate claims and spread a lot of misinformation. The Fantom Foundation’s statement pointed out that the 25 projects outlined in the piece were not terminated. It stated that the two simply terminated their roles in the project and would be handing over the projects to the existing teams. According to the Foundation, many of the teams have already been developing and running independently of Anton and Andre.
The Foundation also went on to explain that neither Nell nor Cronje were core developers at Fantom. They stated that Fantom was itself not involved in the development of any of the 25 projects that were in question. This includes Yearn. Finance. According to the statement, Cronje only worked in an advisory role on Fantom. He was not a lead developer like many in the crypto space are making him out to be. His role was in advising on high level cash and technical management. Cronje also played the role of connecting individuals and projects that he believed were good for the Fantom Network.
The clarification issued by the Fantom Foundation also included a statement given by Cronje himself expressing his confidence in Fantom.