Optimism foundation sells $157M OP tokens, citing 'treasury management'

The foundation behind layer2 blockchain Optimism has sold 116 million OP tokens ($157 million) to seven separate buyers, according to an announcement on the Optimism governance website.

The token sale was described as a "private" and "planned" event with the tokens originating from an unallocated portion of the OP Token treasury. Optimism's treasury remains at around $1.25 billion, all of which is made up of its own token, DefiLlama data shows.

The seven buyers will be allowed to delegate the tokens to third parties in order to participate in blockchain governance.

The foundation also issued its third community airdrop earlier this week, with over 31,000 users receiving a share of 19.4 million tokens. Circulating supply, however, remains relatively low compared to the total supply with a further 570 million tokens being allocated to future airdrops. OP's circulating supply is 18.59% of its total supply, according to CoinMarketCap.

OP is currently trading at $1.35 having lost 2.19% of its value over the past 24-hours, according to CoinDesk data.