Helium’s CEO Amir Haleem stepped down this week, and the timing looks rough when you line it up with the company’s recent moves and the performance of HNT, its main token.
CEO exit lands right after a business offload
Protos reports that HNT is down 96% and that Haleem announced his resignation “yesterday.” He didn’t make a formal statement. Instead, Protos says he quote-tweeted a video posted by his replacement, Mario Di Dio.
Haleem is stepping aside as chief executive of Nova Labs, the company behind Helium, and moving to a chairman role. On X, Protos notes that some users framed the change as a deserved break after a long career.
But the token chart tells a different story. Protos reports that HNT fell another 15% on the day of Haleem’s goodbye.
The sequence: Mobile sold, HNT still sinks
The eyebrow-raiser is what happened just before the resignation.
Protos says Nova Labs offloaded its consumer business on June 2, 2026. Helium Mobile, a budget cellphone service that Protos describes as having lent Helium “a sliver of legitimacy,” went to Noble Mobile.
HNT didn’t respond with a rally. Protos reports HNT remained down 30% over the past week and down 46% over the past month, even after the Mobile sale.
Then, according to Protos, Haleem resigned two days later. The desk doesn’t know intent from dates alone. It can still point out that the sequence reads cleanly.
Token incentives have been a long bleed
The financial context is bigger than the last two weeks.
Protos says Helium issued three tokens to incentivize operators of its once-faddish networking devices. Those were MOBILE, IOT, and HNT.
Over the past five years, Protos reports declines of 76% for MOBILE, 87% for IOT, and 96% for HNT.
Protos also reports that as he left, Haleem “made sure to assure everyone that he still holds HNT.” For token holders, that doesn’t change the risk profile of the asset. It does, however, underscore that management moves don’t automatically correlate with price stabilization.
SEC case, settlement, and the gap between narratives
Helium also spent years collecting regulatory and credibility problems.
Protos reports that Helium raised nearly $365 million over its lifetime, with FTX as one of its backers.
In 2022, Protos says the company was caught advertising Lime, Salesforce, and Nestlé as network users, even though none of them were.
A Forbes investigation later found that insiders mined close to half of all HNT in its first months, according to Protos.
The SEC eventually sued Nova Labs in January 2025 over “materially false and misleading statements,” Protos says, including claims tied to Lime, Nestlé, and Salesforce.
Protos reports that after Gary Gensler resigned and Paul Atkins took over the SEC, the case settled abruptly by April 2025. Nova Labs paid a $200,000 civil penalty over one misrepresentation charge. The SEC dismissed the rest of the complaint with prejudice.
Haleem treated the outcome as exoneration, Protos says. He called it “might well be the shortest-lived SEC litigation on record” and described the original suit as a “bizarre last-minute politically-motivated move.” Protos adds that he thanked the agency’s new commissioners for “restoring sanity to the commission.”
The outcome may have reduced legal exposure. It doesn’t erase the earlier claims or the market consequences, and Protos frames the token slide as continuing through his exit.
What to watch next
Protos’ story is built from two pressures at once: leadership change and market reaction, layered over a regulatory history that the SEC backed down on after the leadership transition.
If you’re tracking Helium as a business rather than a chart, Protos points to the June 2 Mobile sale and the immediate CEO step-down as the practical timeline. If you’re tracking HNT as an asset with risk, Protos’ numbers show severe multi-year drawdowns and a fresh drop tied to the announcement.
Key facts at a glance
| Item | What Protos reports |
|---|---|
| HNT performance | Down 96%, and fell another 15% on CEO resignation day |
| CEO change | Amir Haleem resigned as CEO and moved to chairman. Mario Di Dio replaces him |
| Timing | Nova Labs sold Helium Mobile on June 2, 2026, then Haleem resigned two days later |
| Token declines (last 5 years) | MOBILE -76%, IOT -87%, HNT -96% |
| SEC case | SEC sued Nova Labs in Jan 2025. Settlement by April 2025. Nova Labs paid $200,000 over one misrepresentation charge. Remaining claims dismissed with prejudice |
| Earlier regulatory/credibility issues | 2022 ads named Lime, Salesforce, and Nestlé as users, per Protos. Forbes investigation found insiders mined close to half of early HNT |
| Funding | Nearly $365 million raised over Helium’s lifetime, with FTX as a backer |