Bybit Doubles Down on DeFi with Byreal DEX Launch on Solana—Quietly Ditches Web3 Ambitions

Bybit just made its boldest DeFi move yet—launching the Byreal DEX on Solana''s blazing-fast blockchain. But here''s the twist: they''re stealthily backing away from Web3 like a trader exiting a leveraged position at the first sign of volatility.

The Solana Play

Forget sluggish L1s—Byreal DEX is betting big on Solana''s sub-second finality and rock-bottom fees. No more gas-guzzling Ethereum transactions or waiting 15 minutes for your sandwich attack to fail.

Web3? More Like ''Web2.5''

While competitors chase decentralized utopias, Bybit''s cutting its Web3 exposure faster than a risk manager liquidates a 100x long. Somewhere in Zug, a crypto purist just rage-quit their Telegram group.

The Bottom Line

Another CEX-turned-DEX player hedging its bets—because nothing says ''decentralized finance'' like a centralized exchange''s profit motives dressed in DeFi pajamas.

Bybit continues product expansion with DEX

Meanwhile, Bybit’s decision to launch a DEX might be partly influenced by the success of perpetual futures DEX Hyperliquid. Although the exchange did not specify whether Byreal will support perps and derivatives trading, the DEX subsector has significantly less competition compared to spot swaps, where the likes of Uniswap, Raydium, Pancakeswap, Aerodrome, Meteora, and Orca already compete for market share.

Hyperliquid accounted for around 80% of all on-chain derivatives trading volume in May, according to Grayscale. The platform has been attracting organic usage with enough liquidity to potentially compete with centralized exchanges such as Binance and Bybit in the derivatives market.

Still, the MOVE shows how Bybit has changed its product focus in the past few months as it recovers from the massive $1.4 billion hack. The exchange recently introduced gold trading on its platform, allowing it to offer gold, forex, and stocks. In May, it started to offer stock trading with USDT.

However, product expansions have also come with the shutdown of other products. For instance, the company discontinued Web3 products such as Cloud Wallet, Keyless Wallet, DEX Pro Swap & Bridge, and NFT marketplace this year.

Nevertheless, Bybit has continued to experience growth. The exchange recently obtained the MiCAR license in Austria, allowing it to operate as a fully compliant crypto exchange in Europe. It also announced that it has surpassed 70 million registered users.

Byreal could give Solana a boost as network adoption continues

Meanwhile, Bybit’s decision to launch Byreal on solana represents another positive development for the network. Over the past few months, Solana has seen increased adoption from institutions, with the likes of Kraken, Fidelity, r3, and others choosing the network for new products.

Solana enthusiasts believe this is a sign that the future of finance is on the network due to its speed and scalability, an opinion that TradFi stakeholders also seem to support. Franklin Templeton CEO Jenny Johnson recently spotlighted Solana as one of the first institutionally focused blockchains.

The growing institutional adoption will boost Solana, especially as memecoin, once the major activity driver, continues to experience a downturn. Even Byreal acknowledged this in its post, noting that it could bring more users to the Solana ecosystem.

It said:

“Byreal is built to add new users, new assets, and new demand to the ecosystem. More capital. More assets. More velocity — for all.”

Solana’s attractiveness might not be just because of its scalability, as decentralized network applications also record more revenue than other chains. According to Syndica, dApps on Solana have generated more revenue than all other chains combined for eight consecutive months, with 58% of the revenue share in May.

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