Bitcoin News Today: Lombard's BTC.b Move Fills Bitcoin DeFi Gaps Left by Centralized Giants

Generated by AI AgentCoin WorldReviewed byAInvest News Editorial Team
Thursday, Oct 30, 2025 12:10 pm ET1min read
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Aime RobotAime Summary

- Lombard Finance acquires BTC.b from Ava Labs to expand Bitcoin DeFi offerings, transitioning infrastructure while retaining Avalanche integrations.

- BTC.b, valued at $502M, integrates with Aave and BENQI, complementing Lombard's $1.3B LBTC token to offer yield and non-yield bitcoin assets across chains.

- The $2.1T bitcoin market has less than 1% onchain activity, with BTC.b's permissionless minting and MegaETH launch aiming to bridge liquidity gaps left by centralized alternatives.

- The internally negotiated deal, closing before year-end, allows Ava Labs to focus on blockchain development while Lombard enhances its DeFi infrastructure via the Lombard SDK.

Lombard Finance has acquired BTC.b, Avalanche's bridged

bitcoin
asset and infrastructure, from
Ava
Labs in a strategic move to expand its Bitcoin DeFi offerings, according to
The Block report
. The transaction, expected to close before year-end, allows Ava Labs to offload operational costs and refocus on core blockchain development, while
Lombard
gains a key asset to strengthen its position in onchain bitcoin capital markets.

BTC.b, launched in 2022, holds a $502 million market cap and is integrated across DeFi protocols like

Aave
and
BENQI
. Under the new arrangement, the asset will retain its contract, name, and integrations on
Avalanche
but transition to Lombard's technical infrastructure. Ava Labs' head of DeFi, Eric Wang, emphasized the shift aligns with the company's goal to "maintain and improve the Avalanche blockchain."

For Lombard, the acquisition accelerates its mission to build a robust Bitcoin DeFi ecosystem. Co-founder Jacob Phillips highlighted that BTC.b complements Lombard's existing yield-bearing token, LBTC, which has a $1.3 billion market cap. The platform now offers both yield and non-yield bitcoin assets across multiple chains, addressing gaps left by centralized alternatives like cbBTC and

WBTC
. Phillips noted that BTC.b's permissionless minting capability lowers barriers for developers seeking to integrate bitcoin into their protocols.

The deal also unlocks new capabilities via the Lombard SDK, enabling developers to onboard bitcoin directly into their applications. BTC.b will serve as the canonical bitcoin asset on MegaETH at launch, with plans to expand its multichain presence. Phillips added that institutional and retail adoption of Bitcoin DeFi remains nascent, with less than 1% of bitcoin's $2.1 trillion market cap active onchain.

The acquisition follows months of discussions between the two companies and was handled internally without external advisors. While financial terms were not disclosed, the move underscores growing interest in bridging Bitcoin liquidity to DeFi ecosystems.