The Aave community has voted in favor of the 'Aave Will Win' proposal, a landmark decision that redirects 100% of revenue from all Aave-branded products back to the DAO, effectively consolidating economic rights under the AAVE token. This move marks the end of a months-long governance dispute that began when swap fees were quietly redirected away from the DAO treasury. The proposal, deemed the most important in Aave's history by founder Stani Kulechov, approves a framework that ensures all revenue from Aave's products is returned to the community.
A $25 million stablecoin grant and 5,000 AAVE token allocation, worth approximately $6.8 million, have been approved for Aave Labs. The Aave DAO, a community-run decision-making body, will now be responsible for funding Aave Labs' activities. The 'Aave Will Win' proposal aims to make Aave fully token-centric, with a single asset and model.
The vote resolves a controversy that emerged in December when delegates discovered that swap-related fees had been shifted away from the community treasury. The proposal decisively favors token holders, ensuring that protocol revenue, which reached $140 million in 2025, is supplemented by application-layer revenue from Aave Pro, Aave App, Horizon, and Aave Kit. The application layer is expected to generate significant revenue, with Aave App targeting mainstream users with a 'fintech-like experience' and a card that will launch later, generating fees for the treasury. The proposal takes a hard line against 'value leakage,' ensuring that service providers build exclusively for Aave and do not redirect revenue away from token holders.
Every service provider will have measurable goals, and governance process improvements are planned to reduce friction. On the technical side, Aave V4's reinvestment feature will turn idle float capital in lending pools into yield-generating positions, creating an additional revenue stream.
New 'Spokes' will expand collateral options and address the demand side of DeFi liquidity. The team also plans to invest in agentic AI infrastructure for developers building on Aave. With roughly $25 billion in total value locked across multiple chains, Aave is the largest lending protocol in DeFi, generating $140 million in annual revenue. The target is to scale from $40 billion to $1 trillion, positioning Aave as a financial network that any fintech, bank, or asset manager can plug into.