Ned Scott, CEO of Steemit, arguably the most successful blockchain-based platform in terms of user adopton to date, appears to be cashing out a significant portion of his earnings from the platform.
The operation, which can be viewed on his Steem public wallet, appears to indicate that the head of the content platform is ‘powering down’ 50% of his long-term holdings of Steem cryptocurrency – meaning that over the next thirteen weeks, roughly two hundred thousand dollars equivalent of Steem cryptocurrency can be expected to exit from the CEO’s wallet each and every week over the same period.
The move has prompted a wave of speculation on social media, with some citing the operation as evidence of the CEO demonstrating a lack of confidence in the long-term viability of the platform.
However, some are speculating that Scott may simply be looking to leverage the funds to part finance a new Steem-based venture whilst others point out that the initiation of a power-down can be cancelled at any moment, effectively serving as a common method for performing a one-time larger withdrawal.
“The guy might just be buying a car,” one user stated on Steem’s reddit page. “It’s his money, he can do anything he pleases with it,” another said.
At the time of writing, there appears to have been no official comment from Scott in relation to the withdrawal. The Steem currency trades at just over $1.50, and was ranked as the second most reputable blockchain currently in existence by a recent Chinese government blockchain evaluation program.