A legal battle over control of Ondo Finance has reached Delaware's Court of Chancery, the nation's preeminent venue for corporate governance disputes, where the estate of late founder Nathan Allman is challenging Ian De Bode's authority to serve as the company's chief executive and sole director.

Kathleen Allman, Nathan Allman's mother and the personal representative of his estate, filed a verified complaint on July 24 asserting that the estate holds a controlling voting interest in Ondo. The exact size of the stake has been redacted from the public filing.

The complaint asks the court to determine which board configuration legally controls the company and seeks to challenge corporate actions taken since Allman's death.

Estate Challenges De Bode's Appointment

Nathan Allman died unexpectedly in late May, leaving the company he founded in 2021 without its CEO and sole sitting director.

Ondo subsequently announced that company president Ian De Bode would assume the chief executive role. De Bode outlined the leadership transition in an official June 1 update, stating that Ondo's existing team would continue executing Allman's roadmap.

Kathleen Allman disputes whether De Bode possessed the corporate authority to assume the position. The Delaware complaint alleges that Ondo had two board seats at the time of Nathan Allman's death — one occupied by Allman and the other already vacant. His death, according to the estate, therefore left no sitting director with the power to approve De Bode's appointment.

Allman Estate Moves to Reconstitute Board

A Hawaii court appointed Kathleen Allman as personal representative of her son's estate in late June. She then exercised the estate's claimed voting power to appoint herself as Ondo's sole director before expanding the board.

Allman appointed her daughter Tahnee Towill and Gordon Liao to additional board seats, though Liao declined for reasons unrelated to the dispute.

On July 24, Allman and Towill voted to remove De Bode from his officer, employee, and consultant positions. The same vote appointed Kathleen Allman as chair, interim CEO, secretary, and treasurer.

De Bode rejected the claims as "meritless" and stated that Ondo's current leadership retains the support of key stakeholders, lead investors, and the Ondo Foundation. He also argued that the litigation serves neither the interests of the company, its shareholders, nor the wider Ondo ecosystem.

The Delaware Court of Chancery has not yet ruled on either side's claimed authority.

Governance Fight Lands During Ondo Expansion

The leadership dispute unfolds amid rapid growth across Ondo's tokenization business, a segment of the digital assets market that has attracted significant institutional interest as firms including BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, and Securitize have launched competing real-world asset tokenization products. Ondo Global Markets surpassed $1 billion in tokenized stock and ETF value in May, with cumulative trading volume exceeding $18 billion. The platform has since expanded beyond 430 tokenized stocks and ETFs across Ethereum, Solana, and BNB Chain.

Ondo also launched 24/7 minting and redemption for selected tokenized U.S. stocks and ETFs in June, broadening its scope beyond tokenized Treasuries into continuous public-market exposure.

The July 24 complaint asks the Delaware Court of Chancery to determine the valid composition of Ondo's board and to restrict major corporate actions while control of the company remains contested.