Aave proposes a new plan Horizon to launch RWA products, the community is in an uproar, and the founder responds urgently.

Author: Weilin, PANews

The once-popular AAVE has recently sparked unprecedented skepticism within the community.

Aave Labs recently launched a new initiative called Horizon, which aims to develop products that facilitate institutional adoption of decentralized finance (DeFi) through real-world assets (RWA). This initiative allows institutions to use tokenized money market funds (MMF) as collateral to scale borrowing of USDC and GHO RWA products. Aave Labs hopes to further bridge the gap between traditional finance and DeFi with this product.

However, just days after the proposal was released, the community expressed strong opposition to the Horizon plan, particularly questioning the potential issuance of a new token and the profit distribution mechanism of Horizon.

"Temperature Check" awaits community approval, profit distribution and new token allocation become focal points of controversy

According to the introduction in the Temp Check proposal, Aave Labs stated that the demand for tokenized real-world assets (RWA) is rising due to the ability of tokenization to enhance liquidity, reduce costs, and enable programmable trading around the clock—making traditional assets more accessible on-chain. The tokenization of U.S. Treasury bonds has increased by 408% year-on-year, reaching $4 billion, with institutional adoption accelerating. It is expected that the on-chain RWA scale could reach $16 trillion in the next decade. To meet this growing demand, Horizon—a project initiated by Aave Labs—proposes to launch an RWA product that operates as a licensed instance of the Aave protocol. Horizon will allow institutions to use tokenized money market funds (MMF) as collateral to scale borrowing of USDC and GHO, releasing stablecoin liquidity and expanding institutional access to DeFi.

Upon receiving approval from the Aave DAO, Horizon's RWA product will be launched as a licensed instance of Aave V3 and will be migrated to a customized Aave V4 deployment as soon as possible. To support long-term alignment with the Aave DAO, Horizon will implement a structured profit-sharing mechanism, distributing 50% of revenue to the Aave DAO in the first year and driving ecosystem growth through strategic incentives.

According to Aave Labs, Horizon will feature several key design components, including a licensed RWA token supply and withdrawal mechanism, permissionless USDC and GHO supply functionality, stablecoin lending for qualified users, exclusive GHO facilitators, support for on-demand minting of GHO, licensed liquidation processes, and integration with ERC-20 tokens on the RWA whitelist, with asset-level permission control managed by RWA issuers.

Aave Labs stated that Horizon will implement a structured profit-sharing mechanism. Specifically, 50% of profits will be distributed to the Aave DAO in the first year, 30% in the second year, 15% in the third year, and 10% in the fourth year and beyond.

Additionally, if Horizon issues a token, 15% will be allocated to the Aave DAO, specifically as follows:

• 10% allocated to the Aave DAO treasury
• 3% reserved for Aave ecosystem incentives
• 2% airdropped to Staked Aave (stkAAVE) holders

In terms of operational support, Aave DAO and its service providers will oversee the operational functions of the Horizon RWA product. At the same time, Horizon will maintain independence, responsible for configuring the instance and guiding the strategic direction of the product, including adapting to market changes, meeting institutional needs, and expanding to new networks.

Community Strong Reaction: Profit distribution ratio only 10% after 4 years, unclear use case for new token

However, the launch of the Horizon plan did not receive widespread support from the community, but rather sparked intense opposition. Aave DAO independent representative EzR3aL stated, "I think this decline rate (of profit-sharing distribution) is too aggressive and does not even follow the guidelines here. Because we can all agree that the first and second years may be the market launch phase, so revenue won't be too high unless Aave Labs commits to providing liquidity support in advance, and if such a commitment exists, it should be shared with the DAO to estimate potential revenue. Otherwise, I think substantial revenue may only appear in the third year and beyond, while the profit-sharing ratio has already dropped to 10%, which confuses me." The guidelines mentioned by EzR3aL: Aave's profit-sharing: 20% distributed monthly; Aave DAO's token supply: 7% of total supply allocated at TGE (Token Generation Event) or before deployment (if TGE has already occurred). If the token undergoes re-benchmarking or inflation in the future, Aave DAO will receive additional tokens to avoid dilution.

EzR3aL continued, "Next is the alignment of token distribution, which is the part I am most confused about. Is it (the new token) used for independent governance? For a permissioned market accessible only to qualified institutions, is decentralized governance really necessary? Is it to compensate Aave/Avara investors? Because if profits cannot be shared in other ways, VCs typically expect such arrangements. Is it a way for Aave Labs/Avara to generate profits? Because it may include a profit-sharing mechanism as one of its functions?"

Moreover, he raised questions about how the GHO minting process will work. Will the core instance mint GHO first and then lend it to the instance, or can the instance directly mint GHO to earn income from GHO lending? Finally, "Aave DAO and its service providers will oversee the operational functions of Horizon's RWA product." What does this mean? What parts of the instance will the DAO control under version V3? But once version V4 is launched, will the DAO have no further relationship with it?

EzR3aL expressed further concern that Aave tokens seem to be abandoned, while another product entirely based on the Aave codebase (which the DAO funded through multiple funding proposals, spending $12 million just for version V4 last year) is being launched.

"It seems that AaveLabs and Avara are looking for ways to monetize this product, which is perfectly fine. I have supported all of this since the Ethlend era. To get large institutions on-chain, significant resources must be invested. But there could be other better ways to align it with the community and DAO. For example, Horizon could pay fees in USDC and GHO, and the DAO could retain those fees, while possibly imposing some legal restrictions on the governance of Horizon."

EzR3aL believes that if this is done, we can create a super DApp—Aave—and split it into two branches:

• Aave Market: Targeting the on-chain DeFi ecosystem and on-chain Treasury bonds
• Horizon Market: Targeting institutions that wish to be fully compliant and legally on-chain

At the same time, other community members have also criticized the issuance of the new token. gregrwalsh stated: "I don't really like the proposed token issuance method. I don't understand why Aave tokens need to be diluted. If a new token is needed for some reason, it should maintain a 1:1 relationship with Aave tokens, and holders should receive corresponding allocations based on the ratio. Additionally, the revenue share for Aave DAO is also declining. This is clearly planned to operate as a new entity. I do not support this proposal." ParkerB123 added: "In my opinion, there is no reason to issue a new token. If it is for governance purposes, then $AAVE itself should be used as the governance token, after all, this is an initiative of AAVE Labs."

L1D investment partner 0xLouisT pointed out more harshly that launching a new token for a new business line is a scam. Did Amazon spin off AWS into a new company? Did Apple launch separate stock for AirPods? Clearly not. Investors support the protocol both for its current business and for its future potential. Splitting tokens is precisely the opposite—this is a huge red flag. The market will punish it. If we want cryptocurrency to be taken seriously, projects need to start operating like serious businesses.

Aave founder Stani responds: DAO consensus will be respected

After a few days of fermentation, Aave's founder and CEO Stani Kulechov (@StaniKulechov) responded on March 16, stating: "The overall consensus of the Aave DAO is that there is no interest in other tokens. This consensus will be respected, and Aave DAO is a true DAO. Once a suitable method is found, the exploration of RWA will continue."

"It is now clear that the DAO has reached a consensus that even if tokens could accelerate Aave's revenue growth through liquidity launch, there would not be widespread interest. Our team does not intend to insist on the proposal, especially since this is the least exciting part of the temperature check. I believe there are other ways to guide liquidity and revenue streams through centralized businesses and products that are interested in using the Aave tech stack."

Stani further pointed out that RWA is an extremely important revenue exposure for Aave DAO, as previously mentioned, and should not be overlooked. Therefore, we will revise the proposal to consider feedback. We must remember that Aave DAO is a true DAO, and any preliminary discussions and consensus reached must be respected. Our team has no interest in pushing anything that the DAO deems inappropriate. That is why smart money is betting on $AAVE.

Crypto researcher @0xCoumarin stated that in fact, AAVE's Horizon proposal could be split into finer sub-proposals. The demands of the DAO are actually quite simple: 1. No new tokens; liquidity-attracting funds can come from AAVE DAO; 2. The revenue share for AAVE DAO needs to be increased. The trend of DeFi protocols leaning towards institutions is significant, and the launch of Horizon can increase AAVE DAO's revenue, to some extent. Additionally, Horizon will support $GHO as the primary stablecoin being lent, which can expand the market scale and revenue of AAVE's stablecoin business.

The community's concerns are also understandable. If the issuance of a new token and the decreasing profit-sharing ratio are allowed, then from a profit-making perspective, the team will certainly focus more on building Horizon. Horizon itself is also a product aimed at institutions and does not need the expectation of a new token to conduct incentive activities for growth; the analogy of $AERO to $VELO does not hold here.

The details of the new token distribution are also quite strange. Only 15% will be allocated to Aave DAO, with 10% going to the Aave DAO treasury, 3% reserved for Aave ecosystem incentives, and 2% airdropped to Staked Aave (stkAAVE) holders. Therefore, it is reasonable to speculate that AAVE Labs will obtain a substantial amount of token-based funding income from the remaining 85%, which is also the reason the community believes the team is launching a new project to make money. In summary, the launch of Horizon is a good thing; it just depends on how the community and the team can reach an agreement on profit distribution.