Aave founder pitches 'Uber path' for DeFi after Clarity Act fails Senate vote

Aave founder and CEO Stani Kulechov said the decentralized finance sector may need to take an "Uber path" to regulation, by growing adoption to the point where lawmakers can no longer put off figuring out how to regulate it.

Kulechov made the comments in an interview with The Block's Gareth Jenkinson at Avalanche Summit in New York on Wednesday. The summit comes less than 24 hours after the Senate voted 49-50 against advancing the Clarity Act.

Kulechov said he remains "very hopeful" that Clarity can still happen this year, adding that even many of the lawmakers on both sides want clearer definitions, safeguards and market structure for the industry.

"But if that doesn’t obviously happen, I think the ultimate goal is to really use this technology and empower millions of people around the world," Kulechov said.

He argues that higher adoption could demonstrate DeFi's benefits, eventually making it important enough that lawmakers will need to address how it should be regulated.

"So that’s why I call it the Uber path in the future," he said.

Tokenization push

Beyond Washington, Kulechov said Aave's next growth phase is focusing on extending DeFi infrastructure beyond crypto-native assets and into tokenized stocks, securities and other real-world assets.

To that end, Aave unveiled a real-world asset hub on Avalanche targeting institutional lending and borrowing and allowing certain tokenized assets to be used as collateral to borrow stablecoins. Kulechov said this was in response to institutional loan demand that it wanted to bring onchain.

"Institutions come with size, so that’s where a lot of the demand will come," he said.

Kulechov also added that the tokenization segment has reached a point where the technology is no longer the primary obstacle.

"Tokenization and DeFi are not a technological challenge anymore," he said. "I think it's a go-to-market challenge."

Aave also wants to reach consumers with an upcoming app built around a simpler savings experience. Kulechov said the product will abstract wallets, networks, and stablecoins and let users move money between their bank accounts and Aave.

"I think DeFi will be plugging all finance in the next couple of decades," Kulechov said.