In the DeFi lending track, Morpho (@morpholabs) is definitely the most dazzling 'dark horse comeback' story of 2024-2025. Initially, it was just a rate optimizer running on Aave and Compound, helping users achieve higher returns than the native pools. But since the launch of Morpho Blue in 2024, an immutable, modular, permissionless lending primitive, Morpho has completely transformed from a 'parasite' to an 'infrastructure overlord'. Now, Morpho is no longer just a protocol but the entire DeFi's 'Universal Lending Network'. It has fully open-sourced and made the core lending engine (Morpho Blue) immutable, with risk management and product layers (Vaults) completely open to third-party curators for building. This is equivalent to bringing DeFi lending from the era of 'one-size-fits-all large pools' into the 'modular blooming' era. Due to this extreme openness and efficiency, Morpho has attracted a vast number of top players to collaborate. By November 2025, Morpho's TVL has steadily surpassed 10 billion USD (multi-chain cumulative), with active loan sizes even briefly exceeding Aave, becoming number one globally. Below is its 'love story' with major crypto projects/institutions, which is simply a DeFi version of 'Game of Thrones': 1. Collaboration with Coinbase: The most heavyweight 'DeFi Mullet' partnership (institutional backend + retail frontend)

  • At the end of 2024 to early 2025, Coinbase directly used Morpho as the underlying engine, restarting its Bitcoin collateral lending USDC business.

  • Users can directly use BTC as collateral to borrow up to 100,000 USD in USDC within the Coinbase App, without leaving the centralized platform, while the backend runs entirely on Morpho Blue.

  • By October 2025, this product has accumulated a supply of over 350 million USD and borrowed over 180 million, becoming Coinbase's killer tool for entering DeFi.

  • This collaboration has directly brought Morpho from the DeFi geek circle to millions of mainstream users.

2. With Crypto.com & Cronos: Bringing DeFi to over 100 million CEX users

  • In October 2025, Crypto.com announced full integration of Morpho Vaults, allowing users to earn dynamic returns using wrapped BTC/ETH (CDCBTC, CDCETH).

  • This is equivalent to directly embedding Morpho's institutional-grade Vaults into Crypto.com's Earn, Borrow, and other products.

  • The Cronos chain has also become an important battleground for the expansion, with a stablecoin-exclusive market set to launch in Q4 2025.

3. With Gauntlet: The ace risk partner who 'defected' from Aave

  • After Gauntlet had a falling out with Aave in 2024, it fully embraced Morpho, becoming the most active Risk Curator.

  • Gauntlet created multiple Vaults such as Prime, Core, Frontier, etc., on Morpho, managing billions in assets.

  • It even helped Compound resurrect on Polygon—Compound directly abandoned its self-developed model, using Morpho Blue as the underlying engine, with Gauntlet responsible for risk control; this operation can be described as 'former rivals becoming teammates'.

4. A 'Starry Collaboration' with other top Curators and institutions

  • Institutional teams like Steakhouse Financial, Re7 Capital, Clearstar Labs, Keyrock, Hyperithm, and others are running Vaults on Morpho, managing mainstream assets like ETH, stETH, wBTC, and USDC.

  • The Ethereum Foundation personally got involved: multiple times in 2025, it deposited thousands of ETH and millions of stablecoins into the Vaults of Gauntlet and Steakhouse, essentially giving Morpho an 'official trust stamp'.

  • Established DeFi projects like Lido, Instadapp, Safe{Wallet}, Enzyme, and dHEDGE have also deeply integrated Morpho.

5. Crazy expansion across chains and emerging ecosystems

  • Base (Coinbase L2): #Morpho is already the DeFi protocol with the largest deposit scale on Base.

  • New public chains like Hyperliquid, Katana, Arbitrum, Optimism, World Chain, etc., treat Morpho as the preferred lending layer.

  • Even Berachain directly forked Morpho Blue to create its own credit layer (called BEND).

Why does everyone love to collaborate with @Morpho Labs 🦋 ? Simply four sentences:

  • Extreme capital efficiency: P2P matching + isolated markets, utilization often exceeds 90%, providing higher returns for lenders and lower interest rates for borrowers.

  • Truly permissionless: Anyone can create a new market or new Vault in a few minutes without governance votes or administrator keys.

  • Institution-friendly: Fixed rates, fixed terms, and fully verifiable on-chain execution, perfectly aligning with TradFi and RWA needs.

  • Winner-takes-all effect: Whoever integrates first seizes the best liquidity and users.

From the small optimizer of 2022 to the 'King of DeFi Lending Infrastructure' in 2025.#Morpho In just three years, it has forced old predecessors like Aave, Compound, and Spark to retreat with openness, transparency, and efficiency. Today's Morpho is no longer just a protocol, but an entire ecological empire. All players looking to establish on-chain credit will ultimately find that they cannot bypass Morpho. In the future, when we say 'borrowing on-chain', it may implicitly mean borrowing on Morpho.
This wave has truly elevated the ceiling of DeFi lending by a significant margin! 🦋