Why is Ned powering down?

I know this question has a lot of people concerned. I don't think he's publicly discussed it, but as the Steem blockchain is public then anyone can see what is happening.

I saw it discussed in this article by Hive account@icoexaminer. Note that they haven't posted to Steemit recently. As they say he maybe using the funds for new ventures on Steem rather than withdrawing from the project. He also has to pay for his travels to promote it.

Of you look at his wallet you can see transfers to non-posting account Hive account@brixtonogg

That passes it on to others.

I'm tempted to write some code to see where the money ends up, but I expect someone has already done this. My suspicion is that it's too reward some projects built on Steem and possibly developers who have contributed to the core project. I just wonder why he uses such convoluted transfers when they can't hide much.

I think it's important that his stake gets distributed and used for voting as he rarely votes on anything. I think Ned tries to stay neutral to avoid starting fights. He has voted in the past and some of that was controversial. He's got a large delegation to others. If he completes this power down he won't have much voting power, but he will still control a lot of Steem.

I'm interested if anyone has investigated this further.

I still believe in Steem