Pseudonymous SushiSwap founder returns 38,000 ETH to project treasury after public outcry

Chef Nomi, the pseudonymous founder of decentralized exchange protocol SushiSwap, said Friday that they returned some 38,000 ETH — worth some $14 million at press time — to the project's treasury fund. 

The development comes less than a week after Nomi converted some of the SUSHI tokens apportioned to the project's development team into ETH, sparking furor and triggering a market drop in the process, as well as allegations of an exit scam. That move ultimately kicked off a process that saw control of SushiSwap shifted to the chief executive of FTX. Earlier this week, more than $800 million in funds was then moved from Uniswap liquidity pools to SushiSwap as part of a migration process.

"I would like to apologize to everyone who I have caused troubles to. I was emotional, I was greedy, I was afraid. I made bad controversial decisions under pressure. And it hurt everyone. I failed your expectation and I am sorry," Nomi wrote in one post

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Nomi then posted the transaction for the returned ETH, writing: "I have returned all the $14M worth of ETH back to the treasury. And I will let the community decide how much I deserve as the original creator of SushiSwap. In any currency (ETH/SUSHI/etc). With any lockup schedule you wish."

"I will continue to participate in the discussion and technical implementation of SushiSwap in the background. But I will not have any control. Will not take any spotlight. Will not be part of the governance," Nomi continued. "I hope that SushiSwap continues to evolve. Don't let my mistake deter it from being a 100% community-run AMM. The success of SushiSwap will set a precedent for many more community-run projects."