Maple Finance loses co-founder and COO over strategy rift

Maple Finance co-founder and executive chairman Joe Flanagan announced Wednesday he is leaving the onchain asset manager after seven years, citing irreconcilable strategic differences with fellow co-founder and CEO Sidney Powell. Chief operating officer Ryan O'Shea confirmed his own departure a day later, effective Nov. 27.

The double exit landed hard on the market. SYRUP, Maple's token, traded at $0.12 at 10:36 p.m. UTC Thursday, down 7.5% over 24 hours and 12% over the past week, according to CoinGecko data. Its market capitalization stood near $145 million.

"Over time, our views on strategy, leadership, and life have moved further apart," Flanagan wrote. "I believe Maple is best served by one co-founder leading it forward from here."

He did not soften the reasoning. "I am choosing to leave rather than continue supporting a direction I cannot stand behind," Flanagan said, adding that he will assist with the transition through the end of 2026.

O'Shea framed his exit as a matter of conscience too. "I'll be stepping down as COO," he wrote Thursday on X. "I've come to a different view on the direction Maple should take, and I've decided it's time to step aside." He was blunt about the timeline: no ongoing role after Nov. 27.

What does Maple say about the shakeup?

The company confirmed the departures in a Wednesday statement. "This is an agreed and orderly transition," Maple said, noting Flanagan's responsibilities will shift to Powell and the existing leadership team.

That is where the detail ends. Maple did not name a replacement chairman. It did not specify how the departing executives' duties will be divided. Maple and Powell did not respond to Cointelegraph's requests for comment by publication.

Why did the rift happen now?

The departures come as Maple pushes beyond its core business of crypto-backed lending. In October, Powell said the firm plans to reach more customers through fintech partnerships and lend against a wider range of assets — including payments owed on loans made by fintech companies and securities backed by assets such as mortgages.

That is a meaningful operational pivot. It moves Maple away from collateralized crypto lending toward receivables and structured credit, a shift that appears to be the fault line between the co-founders. In October, Kraken and Maple also launched an onchain warehouse facility for crypto-backed institutional loans, extending the firm's footprint in its legacy business even as the strategy debate intensified behind the scenes.

Is the business actually struggling?

The numbers tell a more complicated story than the token chart. Maple's lending business keeps growing while SYRUP falls.

According to Token Terminal, protocol revenue rose 8% year over year in October. Total value locked moved the other way, falling roughly 11% between the end of September and Nov. 11. SYRUP itself is down 62% year to date.

Maple's latest quarterly results showed continued growth:

• $4.4 million in third-quarter revenue, up 5% from a year earlier
• Assets under management of $4.7 billion, up 18% year over year
• Roughly 1.37 million SYRUP tokens repurchased in September, double the August figure, per the company's October update

So revenue is climbing, AUM is climbing, and the company is deploying capital into buybacks. What does this change for token holders? Very little in the near term. The buyback program continues, and the operating metrics point to a functioning business. The pressure is concentrated in governance and execution: a founder-led firm now run by a single founder, with no named chairman and a shrinking executive bench heading into a strategic expansion.

What comes next

Powell now leads alone. He inherits an expansion into fintech receivables and asset-backed securities that has already cost the company two senior operators, with Flanagan's transition support running only through the end of 2026 and O'Shea gone by late November. The market's verdict so far is caution — whether the pivot converts revenue growth into renewed TVL and token demand will define the next two quarters.