The U.S. Senate rejected a motion to advance the Clarity Act by a vote of 49 to 50, dealing a significant blow to the entire DeFi industry. Aave founder Stani Kulechov said that DeFi may need to follow a regulatory path similar to Uber’s—growing wild first and then pursuing compliance. Interestingly, he also revealed that Aave is moving into the tokenization of stocks and the RWA (real-world assets) space. On one side, legislation hit a wall; on the other, a leading DeFi player is proactively embracing real-world assets. This contrast is worth pondering. $AAVE —are these moves actually hedging regulatory risk, or are they seeing a bigger opportunity?