Jack Paul 
Compound Finance has replaced its leadership team and approved a $52 million budget as it pivots toward institutional users. The move comes after the protocol’s total value locked fell to $1.2 billion, down sharply from a peak of $12 billion in September 2021.
A different market than 2021
Compound was one of the first DeFi lending protocols. It started in 2018 and helped popularize the idea of earning yield on crypto deposits without intermediaries. The protocol says it has processed roughly $480 billion in deposits and borrowing volume since launch. But it has lost ground to competitors. Aave now holds more than 11 times Compound’s TVL with about $14.8 billion, according to DeFiLlama.
The broader DeFi sector is also operating from a weakened base. Total value locked across all protocols has fallen by more than a third since the start of the year to roughly $70 billion. A broad crypto market correction, compressed yields, and protocol exploits have all played a role. Those exploits include the $292 million KelpDAO hack in April.
What the money is for
Compound said the new budget will go toward attracting institutional capital. The focus will be on real-world assets, partner integration, and credit infrastructure for traditional financial markets. The idea is to make the protocol easier for banks and financial firms to use, not just for crypto-native borrowers.
There is some market optimism around this direction. Tokenized real-world assets are viewed as one of the fastest-growing segments in DeFi. Standard Chartered has projected the sector could reach $2.7 trillion by 2030. The current downturn may offer a better entry point for protocol development because it gives teams time to build while prices and activity are low.
New team, new background
The leadership changes are significant. Christopher Donovan joins as chief operating officer from the Near Foundation, where he held the same role. Steven Liu, who helped scale Maple Finance from $500 million to $5 billion in assets, becomes chief product officer. Aaron Schnarch, the former CEO of Coinbase Custody, joins as an executive director. Other appointments come from Anchorage Digital, HSBC, Broadridge Financial, and Maple Finance.
Whether these moves are enough to close the gap with Aave remains an open question. Compound’s brand is still strong, and its history in DeFi gives it some credibility. But the protocol has been here before. The new team will need to show that institutional interest can translate into actual usage, not just a bigger budget.