Three major DeFi tokens — Morpho (MORPHO), Uniswap (UNI), and Jupiter (JUP) — rallied sharply over the past week after Wall Street firms Apollo Global Management, BlackRock, and ParaFi Capital struck landmark deals to acquire direct stakes in onchain financial infrastructure.
The moves signal a structural shift, as traditional asset managers move beyond crypto exposure and begin acquiring governance and economic ownership in decentralized trading and lending rails.
Morpho Surges after Apollo Agrees to Acquire 90 Million Tokens
Morpho posted the strongest rally after Apollo Global Management announced a cooperation agreement to acquire up to 90 million MORPHO tokens over four years. The purchase represents roughly 9% of total supply.
The deal gives Apollo governance exposure and positions the firm to support lending markets built on Morpho’s infrastructure.
Morpho currently secures about $5.8 billion in total value locked, making it one of the largest onchain lending platforms.
Investors responded quickly. MORPHO is up nearly 30% in a week.
Uniswap Jumps as BlackRock buys UNI and Integrates Tokenized Fund
Uniswap rallied after BlackRock confirmed it purchased UNI tokens alongside integrating its $2 billion tokenized Treasury fund, BUIDL, onto Uniswap’s institutional trading infrastructure.
The integration allows institutional investors to trade tokenized Treasury exposure using Uniswap’s decentralized exchange rails.
Meanwhile, BlackRock’s UNI purchase gives the asset manager governance influence over the protocol that now hosts its fund.
UNI surged sharply late in the week, rallying nearly 20%.
ParaFi Invests $35 Million directly Into JUP
Jupiter also rallied after ParaFi Capital invested $35 million directly into the protocol’s JUP token.
Unlike typical venture deals, ParaFi purchased tokens at market price with lockups and warrants for future purchases.
The deal marks Jupiter’s first institutional investment and aligns ParaFi with the platform’s expansion into lending, stablecoins, and institutional trading infrastructure.
JUP rose from approximately $0.144 to $0.163 during the week.
Together, the deals highlight a broader trend. Instead of simply buying crypto assets, Wall Street firms are acquiring governance stakes in core DeFi protocols.
This transition signals growing institutional confidence in onchain financial rails and helps explain the strong price reactions across lending and trading infrastructure tokens.
