POL price surges as Sandeep Nailwal assumes Polygon Foundation CEO role

• Polygon token POL (formerly MATIC) price rose to highs of $0.24 on Wednesday.
• Gains came as Polygon co-founder Nailwal Sandeep announced he had taken control as the new Polygon Foundation CEO.
• Overall crypto bounce also helped POL price higher.

The Polygon ecosystem token, POL (formerly MATIC), has seen a notable price increase in the past 24 hours amid news co-founder Nailwal Sandeep is now the new chief executive officer of Polygon Foundation.

Per data from CoinMarketCap, the price of POL was up 6% and at around $0.23 at the time of writing on June 11, 2025.

The ex-MATIC token’s value reached a high of $0.24 as the daily trading volume rose 48% to over $185 million.

POL’s market cap stood at around $2.45 billion.

Polygon jumps with other altcoins

POL price jumped amid overall gains for top altcoins and Bitcoin’s rally to $110k.

Ethereum, Solana, and XRP were among the top gainers, as was Stellar’s price.

However, more than the altcoin surge, the uptick in POL token’s price coincided with significant leadership changes at the Polygon Foundation.

Notably, Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal announced on June 11 that he was assuming full control of Polygon Foundation as CEO.

The move comes a few weeks after co-founder Mihailo Bjelic became the third of four co-founders of Polygon to leave the project.

Important update from @sandeepnailwal 💪 https://t.co/tPPRSgbUuc

— Polygon (@0xPolygon) June 11, 2025

Bjelic stepping down from the Polygon Foundation saw him join Jaynti Kanani and Anurag Arjun, who were the first two to exit.

Nailwal’s move therefore signals a massive strategic pivot for Polygon.

Bulls were also looking to extend gains as Polygon eyes further growth following key growth metrics in May.

Among top wins for the ecosystem in the month was the spike in total transfers, which increased by 20%, from $67.4 million in April to over $81 million.

Meanwhile, transfer volume rose 5.3% to $141 billion over the month, and active addresses surged 16.3% to 5.6 million.

An increase in stablecoin supply, with the metric up 8.2% in May to $2.1 billion, also pointed to massive interest.

This has contributed to POL’s price breaking below $0.22.

Polygon Foundation’s first CEO

In a detailed post on X, Sandeep Nailwal mentioned that he’s Polygon’s largest POL holder and a driving force behind its development.

He is now the first CEO of Polygon Foundation, Sandeep noted.

“I’ve always stayed away from moving into the CEO role because I’ve been focused on building PF as an institutionally governed foundation. But right now, Polygon needs clear direction and focused execution, and that means stepping up,” the Polygon co-founder wrote on X.

Nailwal’s leadership will see him oversee multiple entities around Polygon, including Polygon Labs, which will continue to be under the current CEO, Marc Boiron.

While there are many areas of focus for Polygon Foundation under Nailwal, the new CEO notes that the team will deprecate the Polygon zkEVM platform.

It means a zeroing in on both Polygon PoS and the Agglayer.

Polygon PoS will target stablecoin payments and real-world assets (RWAs), while Agglayer aims to build a “trustless Internet of Blockchains.”

Meanwhile, Agglayer v0.3, set to roll out the week of June 30, 2025, will be feature-complete except for fast interoperability, slated for completion by Q3’s end.

The Agglayer Breakout program will spin off projects, including Polygon ZisK, led by Jordi Baylina, fostering airdrops for POL stakers.

“With a healthy treasury and several hundred million in cash, we’re in a great position to keep building for the long term, without any distractions or pressure to raise,” Nailwal added.

POL price reached highs of $1.29 in March 2024.