In the cryptocurrency industry, most DAOs are just superficial and lack substantive governance. They often become rubber stamps for founders, with low voter participation rates, centralized decision-making, and opaque fund allocation, resulting in the community being unable to truly influence direction. ------Mark it with a bookmark------ This reflects the "hypocritical" nature of DAO: claiming decentralization, but in reality, power is concentrated in the hands of a few people. However, a few examples such as @ aave and @ CurveFinance are truly operational DAOs that achieve relatively transparent governance and fund management through token holder voting, proposal mechanisms, and multi signature wallets. But ironically, during the transition period of the cryptocurrency market in early 2026, this' true DAO 'is also facing a serious internal crisis, highlighting that even the best practices cannot escape the challenges of human nature and conflicts of interest. Core issue: @BGDLABS (formerly founded by Aave CTO and a long-term core contributor) announced that all contributions will cease after the contract expires on April 1, 2026. Reason: Accusing Aave Labs of causing "irreconcilable tension" and "centralization trend", including absolute control over the Aave brand, excessive governance influence, hostile attitude towards V3, and promoting V4 without fully considering existing contributors. Impact: BGD is the main builder of Aave V3, holding a large amount of undocumented safety knowledge and key connections across 13 chains of $2B+TVL. Losing them significantly increases the risk of upgrading, repairing, and maintaining security in the short term. Community concerns: If governance participation continues to be low, Aave Labs will 'default' to take over control, and DeFi's decentralized premium will quickly disappear. Aave Labs requests approximately $50-51M funding proposal from DAO (Aave Will Win Framework) Proposal content: One time $25M stablecoin+12-month streaming $20M+2-year investing 75000 AAVE (totaling approximately $50M). Exchange: DAO takes back 100% of Aave brand product revenue (such as App, Pro, Card, Domain), V4 as the official architecture, and brand and IP management structure. Controversial point: ACI (Aave Chan Initiative, led by Marc Zeller) has issued an "audit" report stating that Aave Labs has taken $86M (including unauthorized swap fees) from ICO, VC, and DAO, retained 23% of the original LEND supply, and the wallet has not been made public, questioning transparency and accountability. Critics call this a "value extraction" or "slow motion coup": DAOs should have these revenues, but now they have to pay to "buy them back"; Labs holds the V4 development leverage and may shut down or fork the interface if not approved. Supporters believe that this is an alignment incentive, where Labs gives up their own income in exchange for stable funding. V4 can solve pain points such as liquidity fragmentation, cross chain immediacy, and RWA integration. Current status: On the eve of the snapshot voting (with multiple rounds of discussions at the end of February), the community is severely divided, and AAVE prices have been affected (previously falling by around 6-8%, later rebounding but with significant fluctuations). There are no other minor risks or new exploits in the background: there have been no recent Aave hacks, and old events such as Harmony Bridge asset jamming and the theft of a multi signature wallet worth $27M for money laundering in 2025 are no longer the current focus. Market pressure: At the beginning of 2026, when the cryptocurrency market experienced a sharp decline, Aave's clearing volume reached a record high of $429M, but the protocol was operating normally. Intensifying competition: protocols such as Morpho, Euler, Fluid, etc. are competing in the lending market. If the internal competition in Aave continues, TVL and users may flow out. One sentence conclusion: Aave's biggest problem now is not technology being hacked, but internal governance and power struggles - Labs wants to transform into a fintech platform and receive large funding to promote V4, but is accused of centralization and greed; The departure of key teams such as BGD has raised a red light for safety and development continuity. If this drama is not properly resolved, Aave may transform from a DeFi leader to an "internal friction king" by 2026, and AAVE will continue to face pressure. It is recommended to closely monitor the snapshot voting results in early March.