Balancer proposes winding down protocol and distributing treasury to BAL holders

Balancer has proposed winding down the DeFi protocol and distributing its treasury to holders of its native token BAL (BAL).

Marcus Hardt, a treasury council member and former Balancer Labs CEO, posted a governance proposal on Monday that calls for an orderly wind-down. This means there would be no new business development, a phased sunset of the protocol, and closure of the DAO to a legal and practical extent.

The proposal would cancel a previously approved BAL buyback proposal and instead distribute remaining treasury assets in kind and pro rata to BAL holders who burn their tokens. The proposal said the treasury holds at least $9 million worth of tokens. 

Other DAO wallets and positions would be put into inventory first and later included in the first round of redemptions. BAL held by the treasury itself would be excluded, with a limited exception for holders of tetuBAL, a liquid staking wrapper token.

"Balancer tried," Hardt wrote. "In April, token holders approved a plan to take the protocol to profitability on a restructured base: costs cut, emissions ended, the token model simplified, protocol revenue routed to the DAO, growth expected from v3."

Hardt said that while some new initiatives gained traction, none successfully converted into sustained revenue growth. 

Round I & II

If the wind-down proposal is approved, contributor notice would run through Oct. 31, and pools would be transitioned to withdrawals-only on Oct. 30. The first redemption window would open at the end of May 2027 and run for six months, where holders would burn BAL and receive a share of the treasury.

A second-round airdrop would go to those same addresses within two months of the close, covering unspent wind-down funds, later receipts, and unredeemed shares. A final sweep six months later would distribute any remaining inflows.

Balancer said in a post on X that discussion is open, and the snapshot vote for the proposal is expected to take place from Sept. 25 to 29. It also clarified that nothing changes in the protocol until the vote.

The proposal comes six months after Balancer Labs, the protocol's corporate entity, closed down, citing a Nov. 3, 2025 exploit that drained around $128 million from various Balancer v2 pools across multiple chains.