Wall Street has shifted its interests from partnering with DeFi protocols to buying governance tokens

Uniswap, Morpho, and Jupiter have emerged as top DeFi protocols enticing Wall Street investors. UNI and MORPHO have surged significantly over the last three days, posting double-digit gains after receiving investment prospects and token purchases from BlackRock and Apollo Global, respectively.

Wall Street has continued to cement its interests and involvement in the DeFi ecosystem despite the ongoing market downturn. The global finance hub has shifted its strategy from mere partnerships with DeFi protocols to buying governance tokens and controlling infrastructure in core protocols. 

MORPHO UNI and JUP surge as Wall Street giants buy into the projects

MORPHO, UNI, and JUP have recorded significant gains in the last few days as market participants in the Wall Street investment hub doubled down on accumulating governance and economic rights over core on-chain infrastructure.

Morpho’s MORPHO token is up 17% in the last seven days, according to data from crypto data aggregator CoinMarketCap. Data from the crypto research & analytics platform CryptoRank shows that the token has surged by 18% over the last three days and is currently trading at $1.76. On the other hand, UNI and JUP are up 15% and 9.7% in the last three days. Uniswap is trading at $3.75, while JUP is currently at $0.152. CryptoRank credited the recent performance of the three tokens to direct institutional flows from Wall Street giants BlackRock, Apollo Global Management, and ParaFi.

Apollo Global Management, a leading asset management firm with over $850 million in assets under management, agreed to purchase 90 million MORPHO tokens, with transactions spanning over the next four years. Once the purchase is complete, the asset management firm will have 9% of the total MORPHO supply in its books. 

According to data from DefiLlama, the DeFi protocol currently has $5.8 billion in total value locked (TVL) and a market capitalization of $999.73 million at the time of this publication. The acquisition gives Apollo Global governance rights and participation in the protocol’s decision-making process through the Morpho decentralized autonomous organization.

On the other hand, BlackRock also purchased UNI tokens amid its plans to integrate its $2B tokenized Treasury fund (BUIDL) into Uniswap’s ecosystem. The integration will allow institutional users to access tokenized US Treasury exposure through the decentralized protocol’s DeFi ecosystem. 

According to a previous Cryptopolitan report dated February 11, Uniswap partnered with Securitize to fulfill the integration and bridge traditional finance with decentralized economies. The news sent UNI tokens soaring by nearly 30% in less than 24 hours.

BlackRock’s stake in UNI tokens also allows the asset management firm to participate in the project’s governance and decision-making through the Uniswap DAO. Uniswap has a TVL of $2.994 billion and a market cap of $2.381 billion according to DefiLlama.

Jupiter secures a $35M investment from ParaFi Capital

Jupiter has also emerged as one of the DeFi protocols Wall Street market participants are watching. CryptoRank reported that ParaFi deployed $35M at market price into the Solana-based protocol Jupiter (JUP), with the investment company committing to an extended token lockup and warrants. The transaction was settled entirely in Jupiter’s newly issued stablecoin, JupUSD. Jupiter’s TVL, according to DefiLlama, sits at $2.012 billion, with a market cap of $539.97 million. 

Other Wall Street companies also joined the bandwagon earlier this month. In mid-February, Citadel Securities and Cathie Wood’s Ark Invest also executed strategic investments in LayerZero Labs by purchasing ZRO tokens to support the launch of the “Zero” blockchain. 

Cryptopolitan reported that Cathie Wood will join the project’s advisory board and that the project secured strategic backing from Google Cloud and the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC). LayerZero Labs also received further investments from Tether Investments, the investment arm of the USDT issuer. 

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