AppWorks backs Fluid, the lending protocol from an Instadapp co-founder
What's the deal? AppWorksDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has taken a token position in Fluid, a DeFi lending protocol founded by InstadappDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → co-founder Samyak Jain, the firm said in a post on X. Deal size, valuation, and specific terms were not disclosed.
What's the endgame? Fluid targets capital fragmentation in DeFi. It lets the same collateral backing a loan simultaneously provide trading liquidity, rather than isolating assets in separate lending and AMM silos.
AppWorks said this model targets higher revenue per dollar of total value locked (TVL) than incumbents such as AaveDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → and Compound.
Why now? AppWorks said lessons from the 2022 LUNA and stETH market stress led Jain to pause work on Instadapp — a middleware platform that reached around $12 billion in TVL, backed by Pantera Capital and Naval Ravikant — and rebuild a lending stack from first principles.
Who's using it? Fluid already underpins several products. On Solana, it powers Jupiter Lend via a roughly 50/50 economics split with Jupiter Exchange; on BNB Chain, it runs Venus Flux, an evolution of the chain's largest lending platform.
AppWorks also cited Bitwise's use of a Fluid-powered market on Jupiter Lend for Ethena exposure as an early sign of institutional participation.
The firm framed Fluid as a shared liquidity engine that partners integrate, rather than a stand-alone retail app competing for users. It argued the operational burden of running a lending book — risk tuning, liquidations, cross-collateral management — creates stickiness once integrated, forming a distribution-led moat without heavy token incentives.
The signal: AppWorks said it backs Fluid's ambition to become a single liquidity layer for spot, perps, FX, and credit, and eventually an engine for banks, neobanks, and RWA issuers moving assets on-chain. The bet extends its thesis around founders rebuilding core financial primitives rather than iterating on existing protocols.
Read more: CryptoRank
