1inch co-founder Anton Bukov fired, launches Second Tier

Anton Bukov was fired from 1inch in late 2025 but retains a 50% stake. He has launched Second Tier, a DeFi project focused on reducing friction in financial systems.

Anton Bukov, co-founder of 1inch, announced his dismissal from the company in late November 2025. Despite being removed from all operational activities, Bukov retains his co-founder title and a 50% ownership stake. He was instrumental in shaping 1inch’s protocol architecture, security, and economic design. The split follows a significant drop in 1inch’s trading volume, which fell from $14 billion in mid-2025 to $2.7 billion over the past 30 days. Bukov cited feedback from users and colleagues as the driving force behind his push for leadership reform, which ultimately led to his departure. Following his exit, Bukov launched a new DeFi infrastructure project called Second Tier. This initiative aims to build secure, efficient systems that remove friction and intermediaries from financial transactions. Second Tier is positioned as a series of open, protocol-level architectures focused on aligning user intent and protocol permissions. Bukov emphasized that Second Tier is not intended to compete with 1inch.