In January 2026, Sidney Powell went on record with CoinDesk and said a high-profile on-chain credit default was coming. Three months later, Aave, one of the largest crypto lending platforms in the world, found itself sitting on up to $230M it might never get back, following the Kelp cascade.

Sid didn’t predict Aave specifically. But he understood why something like it was inevitable. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Maple Finance, one of the biggest DeFi protocols. Maple has done more than $21B in loans under its newer model, with zero credit losses on overcollateralized lending since 2023.