On June 30, Aave recorded the strongest daily increase in new wallets in almost five years. According to Santiment, 1,806 new addresses associated with the protocol appeared on the Ethereum network in one day.
The surge in activity coincided with a bold forecast from Standard Chartered. The bank suggested that the AAVE token could rise to $3,500, even though it has already lowered its targets for bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) several times this year.
Familiar Scenario With Bold Forecasts
Standard Chartered began coverage of AAVE with a very optimistic forecast. According to the bank, by 2030 the token could grow nearly 50 times. The main bet is on tokenized assets, which analysts believe will increasingly enter DeFi.
A similar story recently happened with Uniswap (UNI). After the Standard Chartered forecast, activity on the Uniswap network also rose noticeably, but the effect quickly faded.
See also: T-Bank Custodian for Cryptocurrencies: Why the Topic Matters for the Market
Santiment notes that on June 30, Aave gained 1,806 new wallets in 24 hours. The network has not shown such daily growth since October 2021.
There are several reasons for the spike. Interest in DeFi has returned to the market, a new long-term forecast for Aave appeared from Standard Chartered, and the launch of Aave V4 on Ethereum has once again drawn attention to the protocol. Additionally, project governance and the Smart Value Recapture model are being discussed.
Over the week, AAVE gained about 23%. Santiment believes that the sharp increase in new wallets may be an early signal of interest in the protocol, even before a more noticeable price movement.
The growth in the number of new Aave wallets has reached its highest level since 2021. Source: Santiment.
Standard Chartered, however, remains a somewhat unstable benchmark. Over the past three months, the bank has lowered its 2026 target for bitcoin from $150,000 to $100,000. The forecast for Ethereum was also cut by nearly half, from $7,500 to $4,000.
But the bank is noticeably more confident about Aave.
“We expect significant growth in digital asset prices by the end of the year and believe that Aave has already moved past the April incident,” said Jeff Kendrick of Standard Chartered.
This refers to the KelpDAO hack. At that time, attackers withdrew about $292 million, and deposits in Aave temporarily dropped by almost half.
After that, the protocol began to recover. Aave reinstated its AAVE buyback program as part of Aavenomics 3.0. Project founder Stani Kulechov confirmed that part of the protocol’s revenue will now be used to purchase tokens.
What happens next depends on what new users do. If the wallets are just a spike of interest, the effect will quickly fade. But if they bring deposits, borrow assets, and increase protocol revenue, Aave will have a stronger base for growth in the second half of 2026.
