AAVE experiences a 14.6% decline over 7 days as large investors make moves and short positions are rebalanced

As of NOV 16 2025,

experienced a 0.61% decline over the past 24 hours, settling at $177.23. Over the last week, AAVE fell by 14.6%, dropped 22.35% in the past month, and is down 42.56% compared to a year ago.

Notable on-chain transactions have brought renewed focus to the

and DeFi sectors this week. A prominent whale, previously associated with a 66,000 ETH short position, has been actively adjusting its holdings. This address recently took out 177,000 ETH (valued at $561.3 million) from Aave and moved 44,000 ETH ($140.2 million) to Binance. These moves have fueled speculation that the whale is seeking to minimize losses from an earlier purchase, which averaged $3,437 per ETH. Currently, the whale is facing an unrealized loss of $125 million, highlighting the significant risks involved in leveraged DeFi trading.

BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes has also been making moves in the market, selling digital assets worth $4.96 million in the last 24 hours. His sales included 1,630 AAVE tokens, amounting to $289,000. Hayes’ recent transactions span Ethereum-based assets, governance tokens, and DeFi-related coins, indicating a diversified portfolio management strategy. Although the market has remained relatively steady, analysts suggest that such sizable trades could temporarily impact liquidity and price volatility, particularly for tokens with lower trading volumes.

These whale maneuvers and large-scale trades are happening alongside major adjustments in short positions on leading crypto derivatives platforms. One whale is holding a 15x leveraged ETH short valued at $26 million, currently showing a $7 million unrealized gain, and is also managing a 5x leveraged ZEC short with a $20 million unrealized loss. These activities demonstrate the intricate risk and reward strategies employed by institutional traders, who often juggle multiple leveraged positions across various assets.

Backtest Hypothesis

The recent volatility and whale activity underscore the need for strong risk controls and thorough backtesting in DeFi and crypto trading. One suggested backtest is to pinpoint all days since 2022-01-01 when AAVE dropped by 10% or more, then analyze how prices behaved afterward. This requires a complete daily closing price or return dataset for AAVE during this timeframe to accurately identify these significant down days. Once these dates are determined, the backtest can review subsequent price movements and recovery trends to assess whether past –10% declines led to similar or different outcomes. Such analysis may reveal behavioral trends and help traders develop more effective risk management strategies.