CEO Search: Applications Are Now Open | Deadline April 3, 2026

1

The governance proposal has passed, and GMX Labs is formally opening the application process for its first Chief Executive Officer. This post serves as the official announcement, and the reference point to keep the community informed throughout the search process.

Context

As detailed in the above proposal, GMX has outgrown the flat, founder-led structure of its early years. The contributor group has organically grown into a multi-functional organization, but without defined leadership, accountability has been diffuse. Several founding contributors want to return to technical and advisory roles, creating the right conditions to bring in dedicated leadership.

The DAO has approved the organizational evolution framework, including the creation of the CEO role, the mandate for the Interim Leadership Committee, and the compensation structure outlined below:

Role Responsibilities

The CEO will serve as GMX’s primary operational and strategic leader.

Responsibilities include:

  • Setting strategic direction and medium- and long-term priorities for GMX Labs
  • Formalizing the leadership team
  • Establishing clear functional structures
  • Improving operational efficiency and cross-department execution
  • Strengthening partnerships, integrations, and competitive positioning across the DeFi and institutional landscapes
  • Driving accountability and resolving cross-functional blockers
  • Aligning contributor incentives with protocol performance
  • Serving as the primary public-facing representative of GMX

Compensation Framework

The DAO has approved the following framework. The final terms will be submitted to the DAO for ratification, following candidate selection.

  • Base: $150,000–$200,000 USD/year in stablecoins
  • Performance tokens: Up to 40,000 $GMX/year, with compensation tied to protocol fee growth (benchmarked from the current ~$60M annual baseline)
  • Exceptional performance pool: Up to 10,000 $GMX (one-time)
  • Retention component: Up to 10,000 GMX/year, vesting monthly over 24 months
  • Annual cap: 75,000 GMX total — achievable only under strong protocol growth and sustained token performance
  • All GMX token incentives are adjusted by a GMX 30-day moving average price multiplier, ensuring alignment with token holders

No meaningful incentives are earned without material protocol growth. Token underperformance reduces CEO compensation proportionally. Vice versa, outsized compensation is achievable under exceptional outcomes.

Search Process

The search is broad and open, spanning the DeFi, CeFi, TradFi, and tech sectors. The Interim Leadership Committee (consisting of current core contributors) is leading the candidate evaluation process, and will keep the community informed here.

We encourage all qualified candidates to apply:

Timeline

  • Submission deadline: April 3, 2026
  • Target hire and onboarding: End of April 2026
  • Organizational restructuring: Completed by June 2026, with a public DAO update

Application form: GMX Labs CEO Application

Thanks go out to the community for the thoughtful governance engagement that made this possible. Further updates will be posted in this thread as the process progresses.

2 Likes
GMX Labs Leadership Update
2

What are nessacary credentials?

3

Anybody who feels they have the qualities and skillset to execute on the mentioned responsibilities should definitely apply.

2 Likes
4

hope the best of the best will apply
and better days for GMX ahead

5

Do hope more candidates could apply to help lead GMX, do wish to see fresh idea and hopefully the candidate could improve the speed of GMX

1 Like
6

A quick update for the community: over a dozen candidates have applied, as of today.

The Interim Leadership Committee has started its first round of evaluations, and will keep you updated at key milestones throughout the process.

2 Likes
7

do we get a vote on the candidates?

Imho the only value an outside candidate can bring is connections with other DeFi/Tradfi projects. Otherwise I would rather have the title CEO at somebody inside GMX. Maybe an outsider as COO (Chief Operations Officer)

8

See this part: the DAO will get to vote on the terms of the proposed deal.

9

@Jonezee and community,

I’ve been following the CEO search for GMX closely and a friend I met at ETHCC today recommended reaching out. I’m a Partner at missing-link.io, a specialist executive search firm. We work with Founders, VCs and protocols (some examples below) and help them with complex leadership hires throughout their growth journey.

I wanted to offer some advice and help with all due respect to you and the community given that this is a critical role and the proposal passed with an overwhelming majority.

There are a few issues I wanted to point out in the way this is set up with the honest intention to help and give solid advice, as opposed to criticising for the sake of criticism.

  • The current search mechanism is structurally inbound only. A google form linked from a governance forum reaches one core audience: people already deep in the GMX community who read governance posts. Your post mentions explicitly that you’re looking for leaders from DeFi, CeFi, TradFi as a target group but by and large, these executives who would genuinely have transformational impact on GMX will likely not be aware of the opportunity via this channel.
  • The timeline, although ambitious, is disqualifying for most top talent. Top decile executives rarely self-apply for jobs and even more rarely make career defining decisions within a 2 week timespan. They need to be identified, approached confidentially, educated on the opportunity and courted, this typically takes 2-3 months.
  • While the evaluators are top representatives of GMX and brilliant builders I believe they may miss the nuances of running a structured CEO hiring process and have limited experience in the process of hiring seasoned leaders.
  • The comp structure, although attractive, requires explanation not a form. It’s complex and would require a trusted intermediary to translate it into something legible for an external candidate.

My firm, Missing-Link is focused exclusively on running transformational leadership searches for top VCs, protocols and projects in the space. For the last decade. Our job is running CEO, COO, CMO, CTO and similar (Heads, VPs) mandates across different ecosystems.

Running this search properly means going outbound. Building a list of 60-100 executives across DeFi, CeFi, TradFi and high-growth tech, qualifying them against a structured scorecard, approaching them confidentially, and translating the GMX opportunity into something that lands credibly with someone who has likely never filled out a governance form in the their life. It means, after weeks/months of work, arriving at a shortlist of 5-6, genuinely interested candidates and making an informed choice with the full market context in hand, as opposed to making a choice based only on the current level of inbound applications after a short application window.

I’d suggest considering a professional search partner for this search with an expanded time window. I know this is coming late and it’s a curveball but I genuinely believe it’s in the best interest of the entire project and ecosystem.

If this resonates with anyone in the Interim Committee, please feel free to reach out at miklos@missing-link.io. In case the community has questions or critiques, I’m happy to address them openly. I know transparency is important here so I chose to approach this in the open, in front of the community. Please don’t mistake any critiques for disrespect, I’ve been doing this for a decade and understand the complexities and pitfalls of a process like this quite well.

Clients and partners of missing-link include: a16z crypto, Dragonfly Ventures, Pantera, 1kx, O(1) Labs/Mina, The Web3 Foundation/Parity, XMTP, Uniswap, Dialectic, Lido, Nomic Foundation and many others. Happy to provide contacts who will give you/the community testament to our work.

Finally, even if you don’t chose us as a partner, I’d urge you to consider pulling in some structured outside help and advice to make this as high impact as possible. This is a mission-critical hire.

-Miki

2 Likes
10

The current search is not limited to readers of the GMX governance forum, to clarify. There are of course other channels involved as well.

But your wider point is appreciated.

1 Like
11

Good to hear and appreciate your response and openness. I just wanted to check in if you had success in finding strong candidates for this? We remain open to collaborate and help on transparent and fair terms if and when the time comes.