Aave wants to retire 75 reserves and 6 networks

Aave has proposed decommissioning 75 asset reserves and gradually winding down deployments across 6 networks, affecting assets with a total supply of $98.1 million and open borrowings of $15.6 million. For Aave users, especially those holding positions in small pools, this is an important signal: the protocol is starting to more aggressively weed out weak markets. As of July 30, 2026, this is still only a proposal, but the direction is already clear.

The initiative is meant to reduce the costs of supporting lightly used markets. Under the risk management team’s plan, Aave will stop supporting 50 reserves with low utilization, while another 25 reserves will be removed as the protocol exits the Sonic, Scroll, zkSync, Metis, Soneium, and Aptos networks. Separately, the protocol wants to discontinue support for 21 Pendle PT tokens after maturity and replace them with new series. This is no longer a cosmetic update. It is a reassessment of which markets actually make sense for the protocol.

Why did Aave decide to cut these markets specifically?

The logic is simple. Every reserve requires oracles, risk monitoring, and liquidation mechanisms, and that costs money even when the asset barely moves. If a market is small, the costs quickly start to outweigh the benefits. That is why the team is looking not at the number of networks, but at how much real activity they generate.

In this case, the numbers speak for themselves. According to an external source, the six networks slated for closure together hold about $13 million in deposits, or less than 1% of Aave’s roughly $14 billion in assets across 23 networks. Against that backdrop, Ethereum mainnet brings the protocol more than $142 million a year, while Metis, by contrast, generates only about $3,000. The difference is enormous. And that is exactly why the team is looking at the portfolio so strictly.

What does this decision mean for Aave users?

For position holders, the key word here is probably not "liquidation" but "exit." Aave plans to freeze reserves, remove new deposits and borrowings, and reduce supply and borrow limits to the minimum. This gives users time to close positions without abrupt moves. That matters, because in DeFi, haste often costs the most.

There are a few more important details. For reserves with open debt, Aave will raise the Reserve Factor to 99% to encourage liquidity withdrawals and debt repayment. The base borrowing rate for winding down markets will also be raised to 5%, and supply and borrow limits will be cut to 1 token. This is no longer a gentle hint, but a clear signal: the markets need to be shut down, not left on autopilot.

Over the past year, Aave borrowers paid about $888 million in interest, but the protocol itself kept only $117 million. In other words, about $0.13 of every $1 went into Aave’s treasury.

That ratio clearly shows why the team is looking so strictly at small deployments. If gross revenue was $198 million in Q1 2026 and fell to $156 million in Q2 2026, then even a few weak markets no longer look trivial. They consume resources but add almost no revenue. And here Aave is behaving like any business that watches its costs very carefully.

• Aave wants to close 75 asset reserves.

• The reduction affects 6 networks: Sonic, Scroll, zkSync, Metis, Soneium, and Aptos.

• Total asset supply in the proposal: $98.1 million.

• Open borrowings: $15.6 million.

• For winding down markets, limits are planned to be reduced to 1 token.

• The Reserve Factor for such positions is intended to be raised to 99%.

Market reaction and why this matters beyond Aave

At first glance, this looks like an internal technical cleanup. But in reality, Aave is showing that in DeFi, growth is no longer measured only by the number of networks. What matters now is how much money actually flows through each market and how much it costs to maintain it. That is why such decisions often become a benchmark for other protocols.

There is another interesting point here for readers in Ukraine or any other market where people use DeFi through stablecoins. When a protocol shuts down weak networks, it means less chaos in small pools and less risk of getting stuck in a low-liquidity asset. But it also reminds us of a simple thing: if you hold a position in a small pool, you should not wait until the last day. If you need a quick exit into fiat, sometimes it is more convenient to sell USDT TRC20 to Monobank than to try to catch the moment in a thin market.

In the past, Aave has already shown that it is ready to remove weak deployments. This is not the first such signal, and that is why the current proposal looks less like a one-off move and more like part of a new risk policy. For users, that means more discipline and less patience for inefficient markets. And for the protocol itself, it seems to be a way to avoid spreading resources across 75 reserves that deliver little return.

What does this mean for investors?

For investors and active users, the main takeaway is simple: Aave is betting on quality, not quantity. If a market has only $13 million in deposits versus roughly $14 billion in total assets across 23 networks, supporting it already looks like an unnecessary burden. This is not about panic. It is about the fact that DeFi protocols are starting to count every weak market as carefully as a centralized company counts an unprofitable division.

For holders of positions in Sonic, Scroll, zkSync, Metis, Soneium, and Aptos, this means one thing: keep an eye on the Aave Governance vote and do not wait until the last minute. The proposal is still at the ARFC stage, so the final decision depends on on-chain voting. But even before that, the direction the protocol is moving in is clear. And that is a useful signal not only for Aave, but for the entire DeFi sector, where liquidity is often spread thinly across many networks.

Frequently asked questions

Has Aave already closed the 75 reserves and 6 networks?

No. As of July 30, 2026, this is an ARFC-stage proposal, and it still needs to pass a separate on-chain Aave Governance vote. For now, it is a plan, not a completed decision.

What will happen to users who have open positions?

Aave does not plan to cut everything off at once. The reserves will be frozen, new deposits and loans will become unavailable, and limits will be gradually reduced so people have time to exit positions. For some markets, the Reserve Factor will also be raised to 99%.

Why is Aave closing Sonic, Scroll, zkSync, Metis, Soneium, and Aptos specifically?

Because these markets no longer generate enough activity. According to an external source, they together hold about $13 million in deposits, and some of them have dropped very sharply, for example Soneium by 95% over six months, Scroll by 86%, and zkSync to about $844,000.

For the market, this is another sign that DeFi is entering a phase of stricter selection. If an asset or network does not generate volume, protocols no longer want to carry it along. Those who follow such changes and want to quickly sell USDT TRC20 to Monobank should remember: news about market wind-downs often affects liquidity and how users manage capital.

This material is not financial advice. Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks. Part of this text was prepared with the help of artificial intelligence based on public sources and reviewed by our editorial team.