Stani Kulechov, the founder of Aave DeFi, reportedly bought a £22M mansion in London’s Notting Hill, paying around £2M below the broker’s guidance price.
Around the same time, the AAVE price, the token tied to his DeFi platform, trades at roughly $126, following a heavy period of negative price action. The backdrop matters, as crypto founders are still wealthy enough to buy multimillion-dollar properties while their tokens suffer and investors get ‘rekt’.
There is still over $100Bn in TVL (Total Value Locked) spread across the DeFi sector, with over a quarter in Aave, according to DefiLlama.
While this is significant and bodes well for the space, lagging token prices and dwindling TVL are becoming a cause for concern for DeFi users and investors.
(SOURCE: DefiLlama)
What Did the Aave Defi Founder Actually Buy?
Kulechov purchased a five-floor Victorian home in Notting Hill for about £22M, roughly £2 million below earlier price guidance. This is notable only because Kulechov built Aave, one of the best-known DeFi lending platforms, with over $29Bn in TVL (Total Value Locked).
And while the Aave DeFi founder has been splurging $22M on property in London, his token has been taking a battering, causing huge losses to investors.
The AAVE price is down 17% in the past week and 47% since this time last year, marking a significant bearish downtrend that has the token trading at $126, -80% below its all-time high of $661.
Worryingly, that all-time high came in 2021, at the height of the DeFi narrative, and AAVE failed to mark a fresh high during the supposed bull run of 2024-2025.
According to Bloomberg, Aave founder Stani Kulechov purchased a five-story Victorian mansion in London’s Notting Hill for £22 million (around $30 million), making it one of the most expensive residential transactions in London over the past year. The deal was completed in…
— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) February 3, 2026
Is it Over for DeFi as the AAVE Price Continues to Slip?
With Aave DeFi being the most prominent protocol in the industry, boasting the highest TVL at $28Bn, the AAVE price being down so badly is worrying not just for investors but for the DeFi space in general.
DeFiLlama data show that Lido Finance is the second-largest protocol, with $22Bn in TVL, but both Aave and Lido are down from their respective all-time-high TVLs.
In October 2025, Aave DeFi had over $41Bn in TVL, while Lido reached $42.5Bn in August 2025. With token prices and TVL both dropping hard from their 2025 highs, it is leading to questions of whether DeFi is finished.
The short answer is that DeFi will likely survive and flourish once more. However, like everything in crypto, things move in cycles. Right now, sentiment is down across the board, and investors aren’t rushing to lock their funds into crypto DeFi platforms for yield.
If DeFi experiences a revival, it could take the form of Bitcoin Hyper (HYPER), a native Layer-2 protocol for the Bitcoin core layer that aims to unlock billions in untapped liquidity on Bitcoin by building its own DeFi protocols.
(SOURCE: DefiLlama)
BONUS: Could Bitcoin Hyper (HYPER) be the Saviour of DeFi?
While DeFi certainly isn’t dead, it is undeniably going through a rough patch as tokens such as AAVE and LDO are down badly, TVL is falling, and investors are hesitant to park their money in on-chain yield-bearing protocols.
This is where Bitcoin Hyper (HYPER) comes in. It is the first-ever Layer-2 protocol built for Bitcoin, and by utilizing the Solana Virtual Machine (SVM), it opens the Bitcoin core layer up to an unexplored ecosystem of products, including GameFi, NFTs, AI Agents, and most importantly, DeFi.
With over $100Bn currently parked in Aave and other DeFi protocols, it highlights just how lucrative the Bitcoin Hyper project could be, with HYPER presale investors hoping this is the next golden ticket.
The market is currently in turmoil, and the smart play is to look for undervalued blue-chip projects to invest in when things turn positive again. With HYPER still being available in presale at ICO prices, there is no better standout right now.
EXPLORE:
Follow 99Bitcoins on X For the Latest Market Updates and Subscribe on YouTube For Daily Expert Market Analysis.
Why you can trust 99Bitcoins
Established in 2013, 99Bitcoin’s team members have been crypto experts since Bitcoin’s Early days.
Weekly Research
100k+Monthly readers
Expert contributors
2000+Crypto Projects Reviewed
