BlackRock "bets" on UNI: Breaking down the business logic of its partnership with Uniswap

Author: Jae, PANews

On February 11, the global asset management giant BlackRock announced that it has deployed its approximately $2.2 billion tokenized government bond fund BUIDL onto the UniswapX protocol for on-chain trading.

At the same time, BlackRock confirmed that it has purchased the native governance token UNI of Uniswap. Although the amount was not disclosed, this marks the first time that this asset management empire, managing $14 trillion in assets, has directly exposed its balance sheet to DeFi (decentralized finance) governance tokens.
Following the announcement, the UNI token surged over 25%. Hayden Adams, founder of Uniswap, stated: “DeFi is entering an important day. This collaboration will leverage Uniswap’s market structure to provide BUIDL investors with on-chain trading settled on Ethereum. This is a significant step toward ‘almost all value being tradable on-chain.’”
This event is not just about listing an asset; it’s a new experiment in financial infrastructure. Wall Street is stepping into the DeFi space for the first time, sitting down, handing out business cards, and pulling out checkbooks. Tony Edward, founder of Thinking Crypto Podcast, pointed out: “This is a major adoption of cryptocurrency—BlackRock is embracing DeFi.”
For Uniswap, this means shifting from primarily retail users to becoming an institutional-grade liquidity backend. For BlackRock, it signifies finally trusting that DEXs (decentralized exchanges) have matured enough to serve as foundational financial infrastructure.
BUIDL’s $2.2 billion “ride” on Uniswap turns government bonds into instant UST
To understand the significance of this collaboration, one key fact must be clarified: BUIDL was not simply thrown into a Uniswap V2 or V3 liquidity pool like a typical token. Instead, it was embedded into UniswapX.
Since its launch, BUIDL has developed into the largest on-chain institutional-grade tokenized fund, primarily backed by U.S. Treasuries, cash, and repurchase agreements.
However, the liquidity of such assets has long been limited to traditional OTC trading or specific redemption cycles, restricting their utility in digital asset markets.
UniswapX is a trading aggregation protocol launched by Uniswap Labs based on an “Intent-based” model, with a core RFQ (Request for Quote) mechanism. This will provide institutional investors with a gas-free, MEV (miner extractable value)-resistant, and best-price trading environment.
In other words, users don’t need to find trading links, pay gas fees, or worry about MEV attacks. They only need to express “I want to swap BUIDL for USDC,” and professional market makers will handle the rest.
The biggest difference from traditional AMMs (Automated Market Makers) is that: it is programmable and compliant.
In BUIDL’s trading process, Securitize Markets will act as a “regulatory gatekeeper,” responsible for pre-qualifying and whitelisting all participating investors. Only qualified investors with assets over $5 million can access this trading ecosystem. Market makers like Wintermute and Flowdesk have also been pre-screened.
This means that, although BUIDL is traded on a decentralized protocol, its participants are still under strict KYC/AML regulation.
This “compliance layer” concept addresses the contradiction between the anonymity of decentralized protocols and the compliance requirements of traditional finance. Simply put, trades occur on Uniswap’s interface, settlement happens on the Ethereum ledger, but regulatory pressure is front-loaded onto Securitize.
Uniswap maintains its permissionless protocol core while absorbing institutional capital. This is a full application of the “Intent-based” trading model: users express their intent, and professional fillers execute under compliance conditions.
Even more disruptive is the leap in settlement efficiency.
Traditional money market fund settlements often require T+1 or longer. The integration of BUIDL on UniswapX will enable atomic, real-time settlement.
This means that holders can instantly swap government bond shares that generate 4% annualized yield for USDC at any time (including weekends and holidays), greatly improving capital efficiency.
For institutions, this level of liquidity will give tokenized assets an advantage in collateral management and risk hedging that traditional assets cannot match.
This essentially creates a high-liquidity secondary market for “interest-bearing stablecoins.” UniswapX provides a low-loss channel for this yield and instant purchasing power.
UNI is no longer just an air governance token—BlackRock is putting real capital into it
If BUIDL’s launch represents a business partnership, then BlackRock’s purchase of UNI tokens is a capital alliance.
For a long time, UNI was jokingly called a “valueless governance token.” Holders could participate in voting but couldn’t directly earn any economic benefits from the protocol’s hundreds of billions of dollars in annual trading volume. However, this status is set to change by the end of 2025.
The passing of the “UNIfication” proposal rewrites UNI’s value narrative.
Under the “UNIfication” framework, Uniswap has officially enabled protocol fee collection and introduced a “TokenJar + Firepit” smart contract system.
All protocol fees from Uniswap V2, V3, and L2 Unichain will flow into the TokenJar, and the only way to extract this value is by burning an equivalent amount of UNI tokens via the Firepit.
This programmatic buyback and burn mechanism directly links protocol trading volume to the deflationary pressure on UNI tokens for the first time.
As of February 12, based on DeFiLlama data, Uniswap’s annualized revenue is estimated to exceed $26 million.
BlackRock’s purchase of UNI tokens at this point demonstrates sharp capital insight.
UNI is no longer just a symbolic voting right but a blue-chip asset with “productive asset” attributes. As trading volume of RWA assets like BUIDL continues to grow on Uniswap, the protocol’s captured fees will rise, accelerating UNI burn and increasing its intrinsic value.
However, the strategic intent behind this move goes far beyond financial returns—it’s about gaining influence in the global decentralized liquidity infrastructure. As a capital giant managing over $14 trillion, BlackRock needs to ensure that the tokenized assets’ underlying trading protocols remain stable and free from aggressive governance changes that could harm institutional interests.
Holding a sufficient proportion of UNI tokens means:

• Preventing discriminatory fee policies: ensuring that UniswapX routes involving BUIDL are not subject to excessive fees.
• Promoting standardization of compliance hooks: in Uniswap V4’s Hooks architecture, BlackRock can use voting rights to support compliant liquidation hooks, creating a more friendly trading environment for institutions.
• Backing asset value: through direct holdings, BlackRock signals to other traditional financial institutions that some DeFi tokens are mature enough to be part of diversified asset allocations.

The partnership between BlackRock and Uniswap is not a mere capital coincidence but a sign that DeFi has officially transitioned from “experimental finance” to “infrastructure finance.”
By bringing in a participant of BlackRock’s caliber, Uniswap is carving out a new moat in the increasingly competitive DEX market.