NEAR Intents integration adds cross-chain solver liquidity to the institutional RFQ execution workflow
NEW YORK, Nov 10 – Talos, the premier provider of institutional digital asset infrastructure, technology and data supporting the full investment lifecycle, today announced an integration with NEAR Intents, the universal liquidity protocol. Institutional clients can now request quotes and execute swaps against the NEAR Intents solver network using the same request-for-quote workflow they already use for spot blocks, over-the-counter options and ETF creation and redemption, with assets signed from their existing custody relationships.
Decentralized exchanges (DEXs) have played an increasingly important role in spot trading: Monthly DEX spot volume on Ethereum grew to over $26 billion in October 2026, according to Talos data. Sourcing liquidity onchain has historically required a desk to run a second operating model alongside its primary one: separate custody arrangements, separate counterparty exposure, wallet and gas token management, plus a reconciliation process disconnected from the firm’s existing books. For a desk with an established control framework, the liquidity on offer has rarely justified standing up a parallel process to reach it.
NEAR Intents operates on a competitive quoting model rather than a liquidity pool. When a client submits a swap request, a network of liquidity providers, known as solvers, compete to fill the order at the most competitive price, sourcing inventory from more than 30 blockchains and centralized venues globally. Solvers carry their own inventory risk, while the NEAR Intents infrastructure manages routing and cross-chain execution, enabling clients to receive a single price and fill. NEAR Intents has now settled around $37 billion in cumulative transaction volume, including $4.8 billion in the past month alone. Swaps typically settle in under a second, with fees of less than one cent, demonstrating the speed and efficiency of intent-based transactions at scale
An intent is a signed message rather than an instruction to a venue, Talos has built a delegated signing service to support the unique key structure they require. Once a client accepts a quote, Talos constructs the intent, routes it to the client’s custodian for approval and signature, and submits it to NEAR for execution by a solver. The signing layer is custodian-agnostic, and Talos plans to roll it out across to a wide range of custodians.
NEAR Intents settles swaps through a verifier contract designed to enusre that either every leg of the trade completes or none does. Bridging and gas management are handled by the NEAR Intents infrastructure, removing the need for trading desks to manage them separately. Positions established through NEAR Intents appear alongside the rest of a client’s book. Onchain balances, staked and delegated positions and holdings across custodians and centralized venues consolidate into one portfolio view, so a new venue does not introduce a separate reconciliation process.
“This is what institutional access to DeFi should look like: no new custody, no new workflow, and competitive cross-chain pricing on every order,” said Alex Shevchenko, CEO of Defuse Labs, developer of NEAR Intents. “Talos connects some of the largest trading desks in digital assets. NEAR Intents is now the route that brings their flow onchain, into the markets and liquidity the rest of DeFi runs on.”
“Talos clients asked for access to solver-sourced liquidity without standing up a second operating model to reach it,” said Daniel Packham, VP and Head of Provider Network at Talos. “Competitive quoting is becoming a real source of institutional liquidity, and it now reaches clients through the same Talos request-for-quote workflow they use for spot blocks, options and ETF creations and redemptions.”
The institutional venue set in digital assets is expanding rapidly. Each new execution paradigm, whether an onchain perpetual futures venue, a competitive quoting network or a tokenized settlement rail, arrives with its own mechanics and its own demands on custody, signing and reconciliation. Talos and partners like NEAR are working to absorb those mechanics into a single workflow.