Two senior executives are departing onchain asset manager Maple Finance after disagreeing over the company's direction, with the news landing as its SYRUP token slid more than 7% on Thursday.

Joe Flanagan, Maple's co-founder and executive chairman, said Wednesday that he would leave the firm after seven years, describing a growing divide with fellow co-founder and CEO Sidney Powell.

“Over time, our views on strategy, leadership, and life have moved further apart,” Flanagan wrote. “I believe Maple is best served by one co-founder leading it forward from here.”

Chief operating officer Ryan O'Shea separately announced his departure in a Thursday post on X, saying he would leave after nearly five years at Maple. “I'll be stepping down as COO. I've come to a different view on the direction Maple should take, and I've decided it's time to step aside,” he wrote.

SYRUP traded at $0.12 at 10:36 p.m. UTC on Thursday, down 7.5% over 24 hours and 12% over the past week, according to CoinGecko. The token's market capitalization stood at roughly $145 million.

Maple and Powell did not respond to Cointelegraph's requests for comment by publication.

Company calls the split an 'agreed and orderly transition'

In a statement published Wednesday, Maple confirmed that Flanagan was stepping down as chairman and leaving the company. “This is an agreed and orderly transition,” the company said, adding that his responsibilities would move to Powell and Maple's existing leadership team.

The company did not announce a replacement chairman or specify how the departing executives' duties would be carried out.

Flanagan said his differences with Powell had reached a point where they were no longer constructive. “I am choosing to leave rather than continue supporting a direction I cannot stand behind,” he said. He added that he would help with the transition through the end of 2026.

O'Shea is stepping down effective Nov. 27. “I'll have no ongoing role after that,” he wrote.

Expansion beyond crypto-backed lending

The departures come as Maple looks to push past its core crypto-backed lending business. In October, Powell said the firm planned to reach more customers through fintech partnerships and to lend against a wider range of assets, including payments owed on loans made by fintech companies and securities backed by assets such as mortgages. Neither Flanagan nor O'Shea specified in their announcements which parts of Maple's direction they opposed.

Revenue growth continues

The announcements come as Maple's lending business continues to grow, even as SYRUP is down 62% year to date and the protocol's total value locked (TVL) — a measure of the assets deposited on the platform — has declined.

According to Token Terminal, Maple's protocol revenue rose 8% year over year in October, while TVL fell around 11% between the end of September and Nov. 11.

Maple's latest quarterly results also showed growth, with the company reporting $4.4 million in third-quarter revenue, up 5% from a year earlier. Assets under management rose 18% year over year to $4.7 billion.

Maple has also been using part of its revenue to buy back SYRUP tokens. In September, the company repurchased about 1.37 million tokens, twice as many as in August, according to its October update.

This article is based on reporting first published by Cointelegraph.