Well well well, DeFi’s big boss Aave is pulling a move straight out of the TradFi playbook: buybacks. Yep, the DAO just approved a $1M token buyback program starting April 9, like a responsible protocol trying to prop up its token while it bleeds out.

📉 Meanwhile, AAVE is down 21% in the last 24 hours. Currently chilling around $120. Perfect timing, right?

The proposal passed with flying colors—439K votes for, 2K votes against. Shoutout to those 2K for trying to stop the DAO from catching a falling knife.

Here’s what’s happening:

🪙 The goal? Strengthen tokenomics and “align incentives” (aka, stop the bleeding).

💰 Weekly buybacks of $1M over 6 months.

🎯 First phase: $4M worth of aEthUSDT ready to roll.

🔄 Buybacks will be handled via an automated Aave Swapper contract—because if you’re gonna burn cash, might as well automate it.

A new Aave Finance Committee (AFC) has been formed to babysit the treasury and oversee execution. No direct treasury-to-token transfers, all budgeted and governance-approved—so you can still call it decentralized, I guess.

Marc Zeller (Mr. Aave Chan Initiative himself) says the DAO is aiming to own 2.5% of AAVE’s supply by year’s end. Also hinted that this “6-month plan” could end up being the start of a forever-buyback meta. Quoting the man himself:

“Buybacks are forever.”

Translation: We’re in forever-dip territory and someone’s gotta be the buyer of last resort.

So, bullish or just another DAO throwing money at price charts? Either way, congrats to whoever sells into the buybacks next week. 🥂

Thoughts? Are DAO buybacks the new liquidity mining? Or are we speedrunning TradFi’s greatest hits in bear market cosplay?