Aave founder Stani Kulechov has publicly challenged positions taken by European authorities as the European Commission reviews the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA).
In comments published on October 2, 2026, he said he was disappointed by the European Central Bank and the European Banking Authority’s submissions to the MiCA consultation.
Those submissions, he argued, go beyond existing limits by calling for a ban on yields paid on stablecoins.
They also seek tighter limits on how crypto-asset service providers can connect customers to decentralized finance.
That would cover protocols that generate returns on stablecoins not authorized under MiCA, even though the authorities have not set out a workable description of how such access should operate.
Kulechov further noted that the responses favor confining DeFi access, for providers that offer it, to selected categories of users through so-called suitability tests.
They also raise the possibility of a certification system for decentralized lending protocols.
He said it is not clear how either requirement could be applied in practice.
If public authorities themselves decide which protocols count as appropriate for users in Europe, the outcome could diverge sharply from the open DeFi markets that exist now.
In his view, the more likely result would be additional walled gardens.
Those closed environments would weaken the liquidity and network effects that open financial systems depend on, and would narrow the options Europeans have for building or protecting wealth.
Disappointed by the European Central Bank’s (ECB) and European Banking Authority’s (EBA) responses to the MiCA consultation.
They are not only advocating for a prohibition on paying yield on stablecoins, but also for restrictions on CASPs providing access to DeFi, including…
— Stani (@StaniKulechov) October 2, 2026
Although the proposals are framed as consumer protection, he warned that overly broad limits can instead add friction, slow innovation, and delay the growth of financial infrastructure that is open, transparent, and auditable.
He contrasted that approach with the practical capacity of onchain systems. Stablecoins, decentralized finance, and tokenized securities, he said, can reduce operational drag, improve visibility, and widen access to financial opportunities.
Consumers and businesses in Europe stand to gain if firms developing that infrastructure are able to keep building and competing from inside the region.
He also observed that US agencies, including the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), have lately shown a more pragmatic stance toward onchain innovation.
Kulechov urged European authorities to place users and their interests at the center of the rulebook.
Banks and other established firms, he argued, should adjust their models so they can serve customers in an economy that is moving onchain, rather than depend on artificial barriers that raise costs and cut access while activity elsewhere continues.
He closed by stating that decentralized finance will ultimately prevail.
The remarks sit against Aave Labs’ own late-September submission to the Commission’s MiCA review, in which the firm pressed for clearer treatment of lending returns and for rules that leave room for non-custodial protocols.
The exchange highlights a live dispute over how far Europe’s crypto framework should reach into yield products and into the gateways that regulated firms use to reach decentralized markets.