On February 26, participants in the Aave DAO will hold a preliminary vote on the Aave Will Win proposal. This initiative has sparked conflict within the community as Aave Labs has requested approximately $50 million in funding.
The proposal allocates $42.5 million in stablecoins and 75,000 AAVE tokens to developers. In return, they promise to direct 100% of the revenue from Aave-branded products to the DAO treasury. The proposal also includes a plan for developing Aave v4 as the protocol's foundation.
Ahead of the vote, two opposing reports were published.
Mark Zeller, founder of the Aave Chan Initiative (ACI), calculated that Aave Labs has received $86 million over time, including funds from ICOs, venture investors, and DAO sponsors.
Zeller emphasized that future grants should be evaluated based on their impact on revenue. He called for transparent reporting and suggested breaking the initiative into several votes.
In response, Aave Labs released its own report. The team reminded the community that it created versions v1, v2, and v3, as well as key monetization protocols like flash loans.
According to the developers, the actual work on code, security, and infrastructure cannot be measured by the number of forum posts made.
Some community members expressed concern over the size of the requested amount. There is also outrage over the transfer of 75,000 AAVE tokens, as these assets confer voting rights in the project.
after 5 years of being an aave holder, I think I'm done
— post rich (@0xpostrich) February 25, 2026
I can't stand how obnoxious things have gotten
make a rash proposal, community in clear disagreement, control a large voting stake, win the vote regardless.
the art of the deal.
Critics are demanding a clearer definition of revenue and disclosure of management token data.
It is worth noting that starting April 1, BGD Labs, one of Aave's key technical developers, will cease collaboration with the project due to "radical changes" in the DAO's structure.