Aave has launched its lending markets on Sonic, a new high-performance blockchain that evolved from Fantom. This marks Aave’s first Layer 1 expansion in 2023. The decision to deploy Aave version 3 on Sonic came after a governance vote by the Aave Chan Initiative.
Sonic rebranded from Fantom and launched its mainnet in December 2024. The network has a total value locked of over $700 million. It also offers a fee monetization model for developers. This model allows decentralized protocols like Aave to earn a share of transaction fees from user activities. This could provide Aave with an additional income source.
Stani Kulechov, the founder of Aave Labs, expressed that Sonic’s revenue-sharing model and team expertise present a great opportunity for Aave to grow within a community-focused DeFi ecosystem. Aave’s move to Sonic is backed by significant liquidity commitments. This includes $15 million from the Sonic Foundation, up to 50 million Sonic-native $S tokens, and $800,000 in stablecoins from Aave.
Recently, Aave governance decided to stop lending operations on the Polygon PoS chain. This decision was made due to concerns about risks associated with Polygon’s pre-PIP proposal to rehypothecate stablecoins. Although Polygon did not move forward with the proposal, Aave contributors chose to halt operations on that chain.
Kulechov stated that the Aave community prioritizes risk management. After thorough discussions in the Aave forum, the community concluded that the risks in the original proposal warranted stopping activities on Polygon.
