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The State of DAO M&A

In late 2021, two DeFi DAOs — Fei Protocol and Rari Capital — embarked on what was supposed to be a transformative merger. The idea was simple: Fei, with its algorithmic stablecoin, would join forces with Rari, a pioneer in permissionless lending pools, to create a DeFi powerhouse governed by a single DAO. Their communities approved the merger with overwhelming support, and in December, Tribe DAO was born.
Nine months later, it was dead.
The Fei-Rari collapse sent shockwaves through the ecosystem, but it was hardly the only DAO M&A, even in 2021. Gnosis and xDAI (a qualified success), Aragon and Vocdoni (a middling failure), Yearn and Cream/Sushi/Pickle (hard to tell) all came together. Since 2020, more than 65 deals have been executed by DAOs looking to scale, merge or consolidate. Today, the state of DAO M&A is more vibrant than ever.
Traditional M&A has clear playbooks. Corporate boards negotiate deals, investment banks structure financing, and legal teams ensure compliance. But DAOs have been operating in uncharted waters. Governance is chaotic. There’s no CEO to sign off on a deal, and token holders vote, often with unpredictable outcomes. Or they learn about it after the fact, as with Aragon’s community.
As we discovered in writing the State of DAO M&A report: valuations are murky, as DAO tokens fluctuate wildly, making it difficult to price acquisitions fairly or to satisfy token holder expectations, as evidenced in Fei-Rari and in Gnosis-xDAI. Regulation is a landmine. The absence of standards for legally binding DAO transactions prevents potentially valuable agreements from being implemented.
Instead, DAOs are turning to token migrations and swap contracts as workarounds to regulatory uncertainty. Security concerns remain challenging for DAOs, as hacks can erase billions in value overnight. Just ask Fei’s token holders, who had to cover $80 million in the Rari exploit.
And sometimes the «mergers» aren’t mergers at all: Yearn Finance’s advertised mergers with Yearn, PIckle, Cream, SushiSwap, and Akropolis were really a series of loose partnerships that generated significant confusion over governance and responsibilities.
With all that said, we believe that M&A can be a DAO superpower. That is, DAOs can feasibly execute M&As more efficiently and recognize more synergies than any traditional organization. Imagine standardized swap and acquisition contracts, platforms for M&A discovery, or protocol conglomerates that create richer, more integrated on-chain ecosystems.
Despite challenges, DAO M&A is here to stay. If anything, the increasing complexity of Web3 ecosystems makes consolidation inevitable. But, for future deals to succeed, DAOs must rethink how they approach M&A. Better governance alignment is crucial, as DAOs need structured frameworks to align stakeholder incentives and avoid the infighting that doomed Fei-Rari.
More thoughtful valuations are necessary since a token swap is not the same as a cash buyout; valuation models must account for token liquidity, governance power, and future earnings potential. Security must be a top priority, with rigorous smart contract audits and stress tests to prevent both catastrophic exploits. And DAOs must engage with these complex dynamics instead of hand-waving them away — and invest in the infrastructure and partnerships to execute them.
If DAOs can learn from these early experiments, M&A could become a critical tool for building resilient and scalable decentralized organizations.
But we’re not there yet. Merging DAOs isn’t just about putting two treasuries together. It’s about integrating communities, governance structures, and technical systems in ways that enhance — not undermine — the value of these organizations.
The full State of DAO M&A (February 2025) report by DAOstar, Areta, and Emory University is available here.
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Hashdex Seeks to Expand U.S. Crypto ETF to Include Litecoin, XRP and Other Altcoins

Crypto asset manager Hashdex filed an amendment with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) seeking to add litecoin (LTC) and XRP among other cryptocurrencies to its Nasdaq Crypto Index US ETF.
The proposal also lists cardano’s ADA, solana’s SOL and other altcoins including LINK, AVAX and UNI. The fund is currently mostly bitcoin (BTC) with some exposure to ether (ETH), according to Hashdex’s website.
An alternative version of the fund traded on the Bermuda Stock Exchange, the Hashdex Nasdaq Crypto Index ETF, already offers exposure to the broader basket of cryptocurrencies. The Hashdex Nasdaq Crypto Index US ETF is designed to track a diversified set of digital assets, offering investors regulated exposure to the crypto market.
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Tokenization Specialists Securitize and Ethena Unveil Institutional DeFi Blockchain

Securitize and Ethena Labs, two firms working closely with BlackRock’s money market token BUIDL, have created an Ethereum-compatible blockchain called Converge, designed to house tokenized assets and provide institutional investors with the innovation of decentralized finance (DeFi).
Ethena, which offers a yield-bearing USDe token as well as a BUIDL-backed USDtb stablecoin, will migrate its $6 billion DeFi ecosystem to Converge, while Securitize, the transfer agent for BlackRock’s BUIDL token, will bring its suite of tokenized real world assets (RWAs), like the recently-issued Apollo credit fund token, to the new chain.
From in the early days of DeFi there has been a concerted effort to expand beyond cryptocurrencies and bring traditional assets on chain as collateral. Today, traditional financial firms are clamouring to get in the tokenization race, so it makes sense for firms like Securitize and Ethena to create an institutional-friendly path to DeFi.
“Tokenization, per se, is just putting your securities on a different ledger, and it produces cost savings and efficiencies, but it doesn’t necessarily lead to anything significantly different in terms of what you can do with these assets,” said Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo in an interview. “On the other hand, crypto has been developing very novel ways of using digital assets. If you could actually bring that DeFi innovation back into the RWA space it could make it explode.”
Securitize and Ethena have brought a sturdy firm of initial partners to Converge, including Pendle, Avara (the parent company of Aave Labs), Ethereal, Morpho, and Maple Finance. Custodial services will be provided by Copper, Fireblocks, Komainu, and Zodia, while interoperability will come via LayerZero, Wormhole and oracle support from RedStone.
Looking ahead to what can be built using the Converge blockchain, Ethena founder Guy Young said there will be new products courtesy of Securitize to be housed on the chain, opening up new use cases.
“That might be using this stuff as collateral within tailor-made money markets, or it could be trading of different assets which don’t exist on-chain now at real scale, so that might be equities or whatever, going forward,” Young said in an interview. “We think something that’s purpose built for this intersection of TradFi and Defi is going to be one of the largest opportunities over the next few years.”
Converge will be compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), enabling it to run Ethereum-based smart contracts, dApps, and tools without modification. It will boast performance that is in line with industry-leading blockchains, according to a press release.
Ethena’s native governance token, ENA, will serve as a stakeable asset (via sENA) for Converge, securing the network with a permissioned validator set composed of traditional finance entities and centralized exchanges. Both USDe and USDtb will serve as gas tokens for the network.
Converge is a public open chain with a kind of know-your-customer (KYC) wrapper, which goes beyond mere whitelisting of wallets, Domingo said.
“DeFi today is designed specifically for permissionless and anonymous market participants and freely transactable assets,” Domingo said. “To bring that innovation in a context where the collateral and the asset that you’re pledging into the protocol is actually a regulated instrument, there are a bunch of things beyond purely white listing wallets and KYC.”
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Canary Capital Files for SUI ETF After Reserve Deal With World Liberty Financial

Canary Capital has submitted paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to launch an exchange-traded fund (ETF) tracking the price of Sui (SUI), a layer-1 blockchain.
The hedge fund manager on Monday submitted an S-1 filing with the SEC after previously registering a trust entity in the state of Delaware — on March 7 — which appeared on the state’s Division of Corporations website.
Canary Capital has filed several crypto ETF filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in recent months, including for Dogecoin (DOGE), Solana (SOL) and XRP, among others.
The decision to launch a SUI ETF comes 10 days after Trump-affiliated decentralized finance (DeFi) platform World Liberty Financial (WLFI), said that it would add Sui assets to its token reserve and explore product development opportunities.
SUI jumped on the news, currently trading at $2.34. While the token is up over 52% over the past 12 months, zooming into the past month, it is down about 31%.
Canary Capital is now expected to file a 19b-4 document with the SEC, making its plans for a SUI fund official.
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