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Why are NEAR, Virtuals, and Morpho surging?

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Why are NEAR, Virtuals, and Morpho surging?

NEAR Protocol, Virtuals, and Morpho crypto stood as some of the best performers on Tuesday amid a broader market rebound back above the $2.4 trillion mark.

Summary

  • NEAR Protocol, Virtuals and Morpho led altcoin gains with double-digit rallies on Tuesday.
  • NEAR, VIRTUALS benefited from positive developments across the AI sector alongside project-specific catalysts.
  • Morpho rallied following the launch of the OKX Onchain Earn product on the protocol.

According to data from CoinGecko, the global crypto market rose 5% to $2.45 trillion before stabilizing around $2.4 trillion at press time. The market recovery was largely fueled by Bitcoin, the bellwether’s rally on Monday with the flagship crypto jumping from intraday lows near $65,000 to over $69,800 in a matter of hours.

Besides this, investor appetite for risk assets also returned after U.S. manufacturing data exceeded market expectations, fueling optimism surrounding Fed rate cuts this year.

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The crypto market recovery triggered a short squeeze across major crypto assets. Data from CoinGlass shows nearly $202 million worth of short positions were liquidated in the past 24 hours, out of the total $331 million liquidated from both sides across leveraged markets.

Amidst this volatility, NEAR Protocol, Virtuals, and Morpho emerged as the standout winners. These assets capitalized on the easing market sentiment to post double-digit gains.

NEAR Protocol (NEAR) was the strongest gainer of the day with its 24% rally to a 5-week high of $1.45 on Monday. The surge extended its weekly gains to over 50%.

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The AI token’s gains follow AI chip-making giant Nvidia announcing a multiyear strategic partnership with Coherent Corp, a global leader in photonics and networking, to advance its optical interconnect technology.

As part of the agreement, Nvidia would be investing $2 billion in Coherent to support research and development, along with expanding manufacturing capacity.

NVIDIA shares rose by 2.93% shortly after the announcement, sparking a broader rally in AI-focused cryptocurrencies. The partnership also comes just days after the chip giant revealed bullish quarterly earnings, easing fears of a slowdown in AI spending.

As Nvidia is the market bellwether for artificial intelligence, its bullish earnings and stock rally serve as a major impetus for related assets such as NEAR Protocol.

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Project-specific catalysts, including the launch of Near FM and Near Intents has also supported the recent rally.

Virtuals Protocol 

Virtuals Protocol (VIRTUAL) rose over 15% today to $0.79, its highest price since late January this year. The gains followed after it broke out of a consolidation from the $0.60-$0.75 range it had been stuck within over the past week.

Besides sharing the AI market hype surrounding Nvidia news and its stock gains, the agentic AI coin also benefited from strengthening fundamentals supporting it. 

In a recent X post, the Virtuals Protocol team revealed that agent transactions on the network soared by around 128% over the past two weeks, as 3,421 agents competed in Epoch 2 of its AI revenue incentives program. Agent-to-agent revenue reached $2.8 million during the period, with roughly $200,000 distributed to builders.

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The team also outlined upgrades for Epoch 3 aimed at tightening reward quality and making it materially harder to manufacture artificial signal, with a stronger focus on genuine demand and sustained utility. 

Morpho 

Morpho (MORPHO) rose 11% on the day to $1.97, extending its weekly gains to around 25%.

Morpho’s gains today can be largely attributed to a surge in network activity following the launch of the OKX Onchain Earn product on the Morpho protocol. The event includes a 65 million KAT (Katana Network) reward pool for users staking USDT on the protocol.

At the same time, there’s also noticeable chatter around Apollo Global’s recent commitment to the protocol, which has provided a strong fundamental backstop for the current price action. Under a newly established four-year cooperation agreement, the $940 billion asset manager is authorized to acquire up to 90 million MORPHO tokens, representing roughly 9% of the total supply.

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Disclosure: This article does not represent investment advice. The content and materials featured on this page are for educational purposes only.

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Crypto World

Aave’s TVL Falls $8B After $293M Kelp DAO Hack

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Aave’s TVL Falls $8B After $293M Kelp DAO Hack

Total value locked on decentralized lending protocol Aave dropped by nearly $8 billion over the weekend after hackers behind the $293 million Kelp DAO exploit borrowed funds on Aave, leaving roughly $195 million in “bad debt” on the protocol and triggering withdrawals.

Data from DeFiLlama shows that Aave’s TVL fell from about $26.4 billion to $18.6 billion by Sunday, losing the top spot as the largest DeFi protocol. 

Aave v3’s lending pools for USDt (USDT) and USDC (USDC) are now at 100% utilization, meaning that more than $5.1 billion worth of stablecoins cannot be withdrawn until new liquidity arrives or borrows are repaid. 

$2,540 is available to be withdrawn from the $2.87 billion USDT pool on Aave v3 at the time of writing. Source: Aave

Aave’s TVL fall shows how rapidly risk from a single security incident can spread throughout the broader, interconnected DeFi lending market, potentially leading to a severe liquidity crisis.

The incident began on Saturday when hackers stole 116,500 Kelp DAO Restaked ETH (rsETH) tokens worth about $293 million from Kelp DAO’s LayerZero-powered bridge and used them as collateral on Aave v3 to borrow wrapped Ether (wETH).

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Crypto analytics platform Lookonchain said the move created about $195 million in “bad debt” on Aave, which contributed to the Aave (AAVE) token tanking nearly 20% from $112 on Saturday at 6:00 pm UTC to $89.5 about 25 hours later. 

Lookonchain noted that some of the largest crypto whales to withdraw funds from Aave were the MEXC crypto exchange and Abraxas Capital at $431 million and $392 million, respectively.

Source: Grvt

Several crypto networks and protocols tied to rsETH or the LayerZero bridge have paused use of the bridge until the problem is resolved, including DeFi platform Curve Finance, stablecoin issuer Ethena and BitGo’s Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC).

Aave has frozen several rsETH, wETH markets

Shortly after the Kelp DAO exploit, Aave said it froze the rsETH markets on both Aave v3 and v4 to prevent any suspicious borrowing and later stated that rsETH on Ethereum mainnet remains fully backed by underlying assets.

WETH reserves also remain frozen on Ethereum, Arbitrum, Base, Mantle and Linea, Aave said.

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This incident marks the first significant stress test of Aave’s “Umbrella” security model, which was introduced in June 2025 to provide automated protection against protocol bad debt while enabling users to earn rewards.

Related: Aave DAO backs V4 mainnet plan in near-unanimous vote

Earlier this month, the Bank of Canada found that Aave avoided bad debt in its v3 market by using overcollateralization, automated liquidations and other strategies that shifted risk to borrowers.

In comments to Cointelegraph, Aave defended its liquidation-based model, framing it as a core safety mechanism that protects lenders while limiting downside for borrowers.

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It comes as Aave parted ways with its longest-standing DeFi risk service provider, Chaos Labs, on April 6, following disagreements over the direction of Aave v4 and budget constraints.

Magazine: Are DeFi devs liable for the illegal activity of others on their platforms?