News linked to both this project and an event.
According to The Block, Japanese financial group SBI Holdings has recently made a series of aggressive moves, completing multiple major crypto investments in succession: exclusively investing $125 million in Gauntlet's Series C, $76 million in EDX Markets' Series C, spending approximately $289 million to acquire Japanese crypto exchange Bitbank, and taking a stake in Singaporean exchange Coinhako. In addition, SBI also participated in Digital Asset's $355 million financing, Morpho's $175 million token round, and Circle's $222 million token presale, and launched Japan's first trust bank-backed yen stablecoin, JPYSC. SBI stated that the company is driving the group's overall on-chain transformation, aiming to provide end-to-end services across exchanges, asset tokenization, market platforms, and other segments, to position itself ahead of the upcoming "token economy" era. Analysts point out that SBI is building Asia's first scaled on-chain asset management business; its strategic core is not purchasing crypto exposure, but controlling the infrastructure of the next-generation financial system. On the regulatory front, the Japanese parliament is advancing legislation to include cryptocurrencies as regulated financial instruments, and plans to significantly reduce the capital gains tax on crypto assets from 55% to 20% by 2028, aligning it with stocks and bonds, providing policy support for institutional entry.
DeSci protocol Bio Protocol has announced the launch of OpenLabs, positioning it as a coordination layer for human-agent collaboration in scientific research, aimed at transforming scientific ideas into funded execution projects. OpenLabs comprises five interconnected layers: Posts & Discovery, Projects, Agent Collaboration, Web3 Incentive Layer, and a Bounty System. Regarding incentives, OpenLabs plans to adopt a USDC yield-based funding mechanism to finance agent reasoning and tool usage. Users can deposit USDC and select projects to support; funds are allocated to audited yield vaults such as Morpho and Aave. The generated yield flows to projects for computation, queries, and simulations, while the principal assumes no risk. When a project reaches the stage requiring real capital, it can issue tokens via the Bio launchpad or pursue private fundraising and follow the traditional biotech path.
a16z Crypto has published an article explaining the rationale behind leading the investment in Morpho. It points out that credit is a core mechanism for modern economic growth and capital allocation, and that blockchain-driven open credit networks have the potential to lower the cost of financial infrastructure, enhance market competition efficiency, and provide global users with broader financing and yield opportunities. a16z Crypto disclosed that it first engaged with the Morpho team in 2022. Since the global financial crisis, the private credit market has grown rapidly, reflecting the market’s demand for more direct and efficient financing models. Meanwhile, institutions can issue their own lending markets that share the network’s liquidity and network effects. The infrastructure in this area is expected to dismantle traditional financial intermediary systems and build a global open credit network.
DeFi lending protocol Morpho has announced the completion of a $175 million funding round, led by a16z Crypto, Paradigm, and Ribbit Capital, with participation from Apollo Funds, Circle Ventures, VanEck, and other institutions.The report states that this funding round was priced based on the average price of Morpho tokens over the past month, corresponding to a valuation of approximately $2 billion for the protocol. Morpho allows institutions to customize lending markets and risk parameters on-chain and has already attracted adoption by institutions such as Coinbase, Kraken, Anchorage Digital, and Galaxy Digital.Data shows that Morpho's current Total Value Locked (TVL) is approximately $6.6 billion. The company stated that it will continue to expand its institutional-grade DeFi lending business and strengthen competition with lending protocols like Aave. (Fortune)
Odaily reports: 3F, a vault protocol built on the decentralized lending protocol Morpho, has completed a total of $4 million in funding. The round was led by Maven 11, with participation from F-Prime, GSR, Gate Ventures, and other institutions. The company did not disclose its specific valuation.Built on top of Morpho, 3F aims to provide users with leveraged exposure to RWAs through a "one-click" operation. Users simply select their target asset and desired leverage multiple, and the protocol automatically executes the entire position-building process: purchasing the underlying asset via short-term bridge financing, depositing it as collateral on Morpho, and borrowing stablecoins to repay the financing.Essentially, this mechanism simplifies the traditional "looping" process in DeFi, which involves repeatedly buying assets, depositing them as collateral, borrowing, and reinvesting. While this process can be executed efficiently via flash loans in purely crypto-native assets, it is typically more complex and less efficient in the RWA context due to issues like settlement delays.3F is expected to officially launch in the second quarter of this year.