Aave founder accused of buying votes for $10 million to gain control over the protocol - ForkLog: cryptocurrencies, AI, singularity, future

# The founder of Aave accused of buying votes on $10 million to gain control over the protocol

Co-founder of the DeFi protocol Aave, Stani Kulechov, faced criticism after purchasing project tokens worth $10 million. Community members speculated that the deal was aimed at increasing his voting power in a contentious governance proposal.

I’m surprised that no one is talking about the fact that Stani bought $10M of AAVE, claimed it was because he is aligned with the token yet in actual fact it was to increase his voting power in anticipation to vote for a proposal directly against the token holders’ best interests

This…

— Robert (@0xluude) December 23, 2025

DeFi strategist Robert Mullins stated that Kulechov plans to support an initiative that contradicts the interests of token holders. User pseudonym Sisyphus also questioned the economic rationale behind the purchase.

On AAVE:

I fail to understand why Stani, who must have dumped hundreds of millions of dollars of valueless governance tokens from 2021 to 2025, would rebuy $10 million dollars of tokens in order to try and take a <$10 million dollar revenue stream

— Sisyphus (@0xSisyphus) December 24, 2025

He noted that from 2021 to 2025, the project founder, on the contrary, sold coins worth millions of dollars.

The conflict arose amid a vote on returning control of the Aave brand, domains, and intellectual property to the DAO.

Former Aave Labs CTO Ernesto Boado, identified as the proposer, claimed that the vote on the Snapshot platform was launched prematurely and without his consent.

Analyst Samuel McCulloch pointed out the issue of high centralization of governance within the protocol.

The Aave vote is silly. @Marczeller v @StaniKulechov making up 50% of the vote, followed by some anons (probably from labs) and then rounding out with more ACI supporters.

Top 3 Nay voters have a majority. GG pic.twitter.com/rSdpUsZHhg

— Samuel McCulloch | USD.AI (@ssmccul) December 23, 2025

The three largest addresses control over 58% of the votes. The leading wallet holds 27% (333,000 Aave), and the address associated with the Aave Chan Initiative (aci.eth) holds 18.5%.

Recall that in December, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission concluded a four-year investigation into Aave.