Coinbase Acquires Solana Trading Platform Vector.fun in Ninth Deal of Aggressive M&A Year

Key Insights

• Coinbase agreed to acquire Vector.fun, a Solana-based decentralized exchange focused on memecoin trading, with the deal expected to close by year-end.
• The acquisition followed Coinbase’s November 20 launch of Bitcoin and Ethereum-backed loans powered by the Morpho protocol, allowing users to borrow USDC against crypto holdings without selling assets.
• Coinbase completed nine acquisitions in 2025, including Deribit for $2.9 billion and Echo for $375 million, as part of an aggressive expansion strategy to build an “everything exchange.”

Coinbase Vice President of Product Management Max Branzburg confirmed to Fortune on November 21 that the crypto exchange agreed to acquire Vector.fun, though he declined to disclose acquisition terms.

The deal positioned Coinbase to expand decentralized exchange trading capabilities across multiple blockchains beyond its native Base network.

The acquisition followed Coinbase’s November 20 announcement of Bitcoin-backed and Ethereum-backed loans powered by Morpho, an on-chain lending protocol built on Base.

The loan product allowed users to borrow USDC against cryptocurrency holdings in under a minute, without selling assets, by automatically converting collateral to Coinbase Wrapped Bitcoin (cbETH) for transfer to the Morpho protocol.

Vector.fun was a decentralized exchange on Solana where users primarily traded memecoins and followed other traders’ positions and investment strategies.

The platform integrated social features, including trade broadcasts and private groups, allowing users to share trading activity and insights through a mobile-first interface.

As part of the acquisition, Coinbase planned to discontinue Vector.fun’s mobile and desktop trading applications.

The company confirmed it would hire all 13 Vector.fun employees to support integration of the platform’s technology into Coinbase’s existing infrastructure.

Solana News: DEX Expansion Strategy

Coinbase stated it would use Vector.fun’s technology to expand assets available for trading through decentralized exchanges within its main application, separate from its core centralized trading business.

The acquisition aligned with the company’s goal of building an “everything exchange.”

Currently, Coinbase only allows users to trade tokens through decentralized exchanges built on Base.

The Vector.fun acquisition aimed to expand access to Solana, where decentralized exchange volume in 2025 exceeded $1 trillion, according to Messari research.

Vector.fun’s infrastructure could identify new assets immediately when created on-chain or launched via major launchpads.

The Tensor Foundation, which governed the associated Tensor protocol, would remain independent and continue overseeing the Tensor NFT marketplace.

Crypto-Backed Loans Product Launch

Coinbase announced on November 20 the expansion of its crypto-backed lending product to include Bitcoin and Ethereum as collateral.

The service, powered by the Morpho lending protocol built on Base, enabled users to borrow USDC against their cryptocurrency holdings without selling their assets.

The loan product converted the collateral to Coinbase Wrapped Bitcoin (cbETH) at a 1:1 ratio before transferring the assets to the Morpho protocol.

Users could complete transactions in under a minute and earn over 4% in USDC rewards. The stablecoin could be converted to USD at 1:1 for expenses, including vehicle purchases or mortgage downpayments.

Interest rates were determined by Morpho’s on-chain open market lending pool.

The launch built on September’s introduction of Coinbase Wrapped Bitcoin and demonstrated the company’s strategy of bringing the benefits of decentralized protocols to mainstream users through simplified interfaces.

Record M&A Activity in 2025

The Vector.fun purchase marked Coinbase’s ninth acquisition in 2025, representing a threefold increase from 2024.

The exchange deployed substantial capital throughout the year following profitable 2024 and 2025 periods after weathering difficult 2022 and 2023 with minimal profits.

In May, Coinbase acquired crypto derivatives exchange Deribit for $2.9 billion, gaining access to a platform accounting for more than 90% of Bitcoin options open interest.

In October, the company paid $375 million for Echo, an initial coin offering platform. Coinbase also explored acquiring stablecoin infrastructure company BVNK for approximately $2 billion before both companies called off the deal in November.

According to Architect Partners, the third quarter of 2025 recorded 96 crypto M&A transactions totaling more than $10 billion, the largest quarter on record.

Other significant 2025 deals included Ripple’s $1 billion purchase of GTreasury and Kraken’s $1.5 billion acquisition of NinjaTrader.

The Vector.fun acquisition positioned Coinbase to capture activity within Solana’s high-velocity trading ecosystem while maintaining cross-chain compatibility to maximize user access to emerging tokens and trading opportunities across multiple blockchain networks.