Yonatan Sompolinsky calls Michael Sutton Kaspa’s informal CTO because Sutton carries a broad technical leadership role. [1] In his essay of 16 February 2026, Yonatan described the burden of “holding the entire project in context, as its main owner.” He also warned that Kaspa should not depend too heavily on Michael’s endurance. [2]
What Yonatan means by the title
CTO usually means chief technology officer, the person responsible for technical direction. Yonatan’s wording is informal: it describes Michael’s work rather than announcing a company appointment. In the Bitcoin Takeover podcast, at 2:16:43, published on 8 August 2026, he called Michael “basically the informal CTO of Kaspa.” [1]
The reason is broader than writing code. Yonatan’s February essay describes Michael as keeping the whole project’s technical work in view and accepting substantial responsibility for it. His point was also a warning about concentrating too much responsibility in one person: he thanked Michael, but said more people needed to share the work. [2]
The work behind that description
In the August podcast, Yonatan connected Michael with two examples: DAGKnight, a consensus protocol, meaning rules for reaching agreement across the network, and Argent, a programming language for covenants, which are rules attached to how coins can be spent. Yonatan described DAGKnight as work with Michael and credited him with its original kernel of an idea. He stressed that developing that idea into a secure design took years. This was an account of the research, not an announcement of network activation. [1]
Yonatan also credited Michael with creating Argent, a new programming language built on top of the SilverScript compiler. He encouraged the podcast host to invite Michael to explain it himself. That detail shows the range behind the informal title: both network agreement research and tools for people writing programs on Kaspa. [1]
Leadership that needs to be shared
Yonatan did not present Michael as someone who should carry everything alone. In February 2026, he specifically praised coderofstuff for taking on ownership during the previous hard fork, a coordinated change to network rules, and Ori Newman for stepping up for the next one. He called Ori and Michael a promising duo and thanked other contributors. [2]
For Yonatan’s own spoken description, watch Bitcoin Takeover’s “Michael Sutton & the Argent language” chapter, beginning at 2:16:43. He gives the informal CTO description there, then discusses Argent and their DAGKnight work. [1]