Crypto lender Nexo is ramping up the level of client funds it allots to liquid staking DeFi protocols as it seeks to boost returns.

Nexo started employing liquid staking — which effectively leaves staked tokens free to use in other trades — about a year ago and has been steadily increasing its use since, DeFi strategist Kiril Nikolov said in an interview at the Avalanche Summit in Barcelona on Wednesday.

Nexo is a centralized service that lets users lend out crypto and receive a return. It generates this yield in a few ways, including lending funds to institutions, trading tokens and staking tokens. Staking is a big part of its business and is used to generate the yield for most newer coins, such as solana, luna and avalanche.

About a year ago, Nexo began experimenting with liquid staking as a way to not only generate more yield but to free up liquidity, particularly for ether. Since then, it has expanded its range of liquid staking platforms across different blockchains and increased the amount of capital allocated to such protocols.

“It’s still a very low percentage” of Nexo’s business, Nikolov explained, although it “will increase as time goes by and ETH 2.0 comes closer.” 

The New York-based bank, which operates a digital assets desk, surveyed 172 clients on their attitudes towards digital assets. 60% of those surveyed expect to increase their digital asset holdings in the next one to two years.

The regulator said that it expects firms to check against its unregistered cryptoasset list before doing business. It also said that it would continue to monitor the use of cryptoassets in custody arrangements and “act where appropriate, supporting responsible innovation, while protecting consumers and ensuring market integrity.” 

Stargate lets users transfer assets between blockchain networks based on the messaging protocol LayerZero. It went live last week, following a public auction of its native token.

 

With a goal to make derivatives trading accessible to the masses, SynFutures is already making headway with the user experience, especially with its upcoming V2 launch.