Aave v3 Explained: How the World’s Largest DeFi Lender Works and Why $15B+ Stays Deposited There

September 3, 2026

In one weekend this past April, about $6.6 billion left Aave. Coindesk reported that the protocol’s total value locked fell from $26.4 billion to roughly $20 billion in less than a day. Nobody breached Aave’s own contracts. Attackers drained a different protocol, Kelp, then dump…