Fireblocks has integrated the Stacks network, giving more than 2,400 institutional clients a direct path into Bitcoin-based DeFi. The institutional custody platform already secures over $5 trillion in digital asset transfers each year, so this move plugs serious capital into Bitcoin’s DeFi ecosystem.
Fireblocks users can now store Stacks (STX) tokens, mint and send sBTC, and use lending and trading protocols based on Stacks, all from the same interface they use now. This means that companies, asset managers, and hedge funds can add Bitcoin to their yield strategy without changing how they keep track of their assets or follow the law.
Why Stacks Solves A Bitcoin DeFi Problem
Bitcoin’s base layer has an average block time of around 10 minutes, which makes real-time DeFi activity difficult for institutions that expect faster settlement. Stacks works as a Bitcoin layer for smart contracts, cutting block times to roughly 5–29 seconds while still settling transactions back to the Bitcoin ledger for finality.
This design lets developers build DeFi apps that feel like other high‑speed chains but inherit Bitcoin’s security at the base layer. The launch of sBTC, a two‑way pegged asset that represents native BTC on Stacks, opened the door for using real Bitcoin in smart contracts, lending, and even paying gas.
Stacks’ Nakamoto upgrade, activated in late 2024, also improved finality and made transaction speeds comparable to leading Layer 2 networks, which further reduced one of the main institutional objections to Bitcoin DeFi.
New DeFi Use Cases For Institutional Bitcoin
Through the Fireblocks–Stacks integration, institutions can now tap a growing list of Bitcoin-native DeFi use cases. These include “dual staking,” where users stake STX and earn BTC rewards, and BTC‑denominated yield through protocols like Bitflow and Hermetica.
They can also access BTC-backed lending and borrowing via platforms such as Zest and Granite, using Bitcoin as collateral rather than selling it. All of this is controlled through Fireblocks’ multi‑party computation (MPC) wallets and policy engine, so every DeFi transaction still follows enterprise approval flows and compliance checks.
Bitcoin DeFi holds only a few billion dollars in value today, while more than $1 trillion in BTC sits largely idle. The Fireblocks integration aims to unlock part of that dormant capital by turning Bitcoin into a programmable, yield‑bearing asset for large institutions.
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