Marc Zeller & Stani Kulechov: Aave – Unlocking Access to Capital With Flash Loans #337

Aave is building a suite of non-custodial DeFi tools that allow users to earn interest on their deposits and borrow assets. Earlier this year, Aave released its Flash Loans feature, which is drumming up a lot of excitement in the ecosystem. Flash Loans have a number of applications like executing liquidations or refinancing and require no collateral on the part of the borrower. As we have seen since they were introduced, they have also been used by malicious actors to exploit vulnerabilities in some DeFi protocols. Nevertheless, this powerful tool is an important “money lego” component that enables various new use cases. Stani Kulechov, Aave Founder & CEO, and Marc Zeller, Integrations Lead, explain their vision for the Aave protocol as an essential part of the DeFi ecosystem.

Topics discussed in this episode:
- Stani and Marc's backgrounds and how they became involved in crypto
- Marc's previous project, Variabl, and why it failed
- How Aave came out of EthLend
- Switching from an OTC model to a pooled model
- Yield hacking and other DeFi use cases
- What the Flash Loan is and why it is useful
- How one can do DeFi refinancing with Flash Loans
- The Flash Loans attacks which happened in February
- Smart contract security and how the community should response to attacks
- Why privacy is DeFi is desirable, but also hard to do

Links mentioned in this episode:
- Aave Protocol website: https://bit.ly/2Ye3If8
- Sneak Peek at Flash Loans: https://bit.ly/3f2Y5qn
- Flash Loans - One Month In: https://bit.ly/2VG6eJA
- Aave Twitter: https://bit.ly/2YnmwJd
- Stani Kulechov Twitter: https://bit.ly/2xdF0jY
- Marc Zeller Twitter: https://bit.ly/3cWIzui

Sponsors:
- Least Authority: Register for Security Sessions on April 30th to learn about security audits for your blockchain project - https://leastauthority.com/meetup
- ShapeShift: ShapeShift is the leading crypto platform offering zero-commission trading - https://shapeshift.com/

This episode is hosted by Sebastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: https://epicenter.tv/337