The top decentralized finance (DeFi) cryptocurrency, AAVE, is starting to show signs of life after months of being at the receiving end of protocol exploits. If the uptrend continues, AAVE could soon start chasing $100 as a short-term price target.
AAVE is ready for a bull trend
In a Tuesday X post, crypto trader Michael van de Poppe noted that AAVE is looking “increasingly likely” for a new leg upwards. The trader shared the following AAVE daily-chart, adding that the cryptocurrency has broken its downtrend.
In fact, AAVE has flipped for an uptrend, as it overcame multiple moving-average levels on the daily timeframe. If the momentum doesn’t stop in the upcoming weeks, then AAVE could realistically target the $100 zone.
According to data from Coingecko, AAVE last traded at $100 in May 2026. Since then, the digital asset made a local bottom of roughly $61 on July 11, before regaining some of its losses and surging to $95.88 as of Tuesday.
That said, AAVE still remains an overwhelming 34.2 percent down on a year-to-date basis. Meanwhile, it is down a massive 85 percent from its all-time high of $661 recorded back in May 2021.
Data from Coingecko, shows that AAVE is among the top 50 cryptocurrencies by reported market cap, with a market cap of $1.47 billion. Over the past 24 hours, the token has gained almost 7 percent, primarily driven by its newly unveiled Stable Vaults.
On Wednesday, AAVE gained even more following the Aave V4 deployment on the Avalanche network. The protocol-level upgrade brings a plethora of new features to the DeFi lending protocol.
Investors are underestimating AAVE
AAVE is one of the few DeFi that is still flourishing in 2026 after coming into the spotlight during the so-called “DeFi summer” of 2020. Along with Uniswap’s UNI token, AAVE has consistently ranked as one of the most-used DeFi tokens in the emerging landscape.
Unsurprisingly, several high-profile institutions are bullish on the token. For instance, on June 16, Grayscale said that AAVE is “grossly undervalued” at current price levels.
Similarly, on June 24, Standard Chartered predicted that AAVE is one of the main beneficiaries of DeFi tokenization expansion.
