DeFi

Crypto Long & Short: Bitcoin-backed loans belong in the cost-of-capital conversation
In this week’s Crypto Long & Short Newsletter, Alec Beckman on why BTC-backed lending is not a crypto story, but a capital efficiency story. Then, Serena Sebastiani on how stablecoins aren’t a crypto product; they’re becoming the settlement infrastructure global finance forgot.

Echo Protocol suffers $76 million exploit in eBTC minting attack on Monad
The Bitcoin-focused DeFi protocol suffered an attack whereby about 1,000 unauthorized eBTC $77 million were minted on the Monad blockchain

A DeFi exchange becomes the first to offer equity perpetuals powered by Nasdaq data
The partnership underscores both the rapid growth of equity perpetuals in onchain markets and Nasdaq’s broader strategy to support tokenized equity trading infrastructure.

Stripe-backed Tempo taps $7.5 billion DeFi lender Morpho to expand beyond payments
The move brings onchain yield and lending to the payments-focused chain in a bid to offer full-stack onchain finance platform to companies building on it.

Tokenization push could pull trillions of dollars into DeFi, StanChart says
The bank projects $4 trillion of tokenized assets by 2028, boosting demand for blockchain-native lending and trading infrastructure.

Aave restores ether borrowing limits after $230 million exploit
The DeFi lending protocol reversed restrictions imposed after April’s $292 million exploit, restoring borrowing capacity across six networks as contagion fears ease.

Yet another crypto bridge falls victim to an $11 million hack
The latest attack adds to growing string of cross-chain infrastructure exploits.

DeFi's new front: VerifiedX bets bitcoin's next chapter is programmable, private
VerifiedX says its Bitcoin sidechain enables programmable, privacy-preserving transactions without synthetic wrappers, targeting growing institutional demand for native DeFi on the original blockchain system.

Crypto users are choosing juicy yields over protection, putting billions at risk of hacks
DeFi insurance protocols debuted with huge ambitions during the 2020 crypto boom. But as hacks evolved and users chased yields over protection, most of the sector collapsed under the same risks it was built to cover.

Lombard joins LayerZero exodus as $4 billion in assets switch to Chainlink's bridge
The shift comes after the Kelp DAO exploit drained $292 million from its LayerZero-powered bridge, increasing concerns over the security of cross-chain infrastructure.

