Babylon Bitcoin staking protocol secures $15M investment from a16z Crypto

Babylon is positioning Bitcoin for a larger role in on-chain finance as new capital backs its shift beyond staking.

Summary

• a16z Crypto invested $15M in Babylon through a BABY token purchase.
• Babylon is expanding from Bitcoin staking into trustless BTC lending.
• The protocol aims to unlock idle Bitcoin for DeFi without bridges or custodians.

The push to turn idle Bitcoin into active onchain capital has received major backing from a prominent venture firm.

Babylon, a Bitcoin (BTC) staking platform, secured a $15 million investment from a16z Crypto through a purchase of its native BABY tokens, according to a Dec. 7 announcement by the venture firm.

a16z backs Babylon’s native Bitcoin vision

Babylon was initially built as a Bitcoin staking protocol, allowing BTC holders to earn yield without moving assets off the Bitcoin network. The project is now expanding toward lending through what it calls Trustless BTCVaults, an architecture designed to let Bitcoin function as verifiable onchain collateral without bridges, wrappers, or custodians.

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The system relies on cryptographic techniques such as witness encryption and garbled circuits, with the goal of enabling Bitcoin to plug into decentralized finance while preserving its native security model. a16z said this approach could offer a neutral alternative to exchange-issued or multi-signature wrapped BTC, which dominate today’s DeFi markets.

The firm framed the investment as a bet on unlocking Bitcoin’s role beyond store-of-value use cases. With more than $1.4 trillion in Bitcoin largely sitting idle, Babylon aims to make BTC usable in lending, credit, and other capital-efficient applications without introducing new counterparty risks.

Babylon was founded by Stanford professor David Tse and Fisher Yu. a16z cited Tse’s long academic track record in blockchain research and his role in mentoring several prominent crypto founders and researchers.

From staking to lending and DeFi integration

Babylon’s staking protocol has already seen periods of strong demand. Earlier staking caps attracted more than $2 billion in total value locked, with participation from institutional custodians such as BitGo and exchange partners including Kraken.

In recent months, development focus has shifted toward BTCVaults, positioning the protocol as an infrastructure for native Bitcoin lending rather than yield-only staking. Babylon and Aave (AAVE) announced in early December 2025 that native Bitcoin would be used as collateral on Aave V4.

Aave’s first Bitcoin-backed “Spoke,” which would enable users to borrow and lend against BTC without wrapping it in ERC-20 tokens, would be created by the proposed integration. The launch is expected around April 2026 and could open new DeFi markets anchored directly to Bitcoin’s base layer.

a16z said it sees longer-term potential for native Bitcoin collateral in perpetual futures, stablecoins, and other financial primitives if trustless designs gain adoption.

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