Morpheus AI Launch Attracts $50M Within Hours

Investors have plowed over $50M into the fair launch of Morpheus, a peer-to-peer network of what the project calls ‘Smart Agents’ – AIs that can interact with smart contracts on behalf of users.

Morpheus aims to make Web3 more accessible by providing a neutral ChatGPT-like chat interface, enabling users to easily buy or sell crypto, send stablecoins, access smart contracts, and use dapps and DeFi protocols.

To incentivize the network, Morpheus is launching its MOR token, which has a fixed supply of 42M. Users can deposit stETH to accrue MOR emissions. The project plans to use the yield generated from user deposits to fund a pool of protocol-owned liquidity.

Roughly nine hours after going live, nearly 22,000 stETH ($52M) has been deposited. Investors have the option of withdrawing their funds after seven days, with the MOR token expected to start trading after 90 days.

The release of Morpheus comes at a time when there is a growing demand for open-source alternatives to existing popular large language models, which are controlled by tech giants like Microsoft and Google.

In its whitepaper, Morpheus presents itself as an accessible, standardized graphical interface with an API for developers, a cloud solution for software access, and a comprehensive system for managing user data and recovery.

Shapeshift founder Erik Voorhees is a contributor to the project but said he is keeping it under wraps to allow early community members to accrue more tokens.

However, with $52M already deposited, the cat may be out of the bag.