Ondo Tokenizes Five Franklin Templeton ETFs

Ondo Finance has partnered with Franklin Templeton to tokenize five of the asset manager’s exchange-traded funds (ETFs). The deal marks the first time Templeton-managed ETFs are available on-chain, extending the $1.7 trillion asset manager’s blockchain footprint beyond its tokenized money market fund.

The five ETFs span a broad range of asset classes: the Franklin Focused Growth ETF (FFOG), an actively managed fund targeting innovative U.S. companies; the Franklin U.S. Large Cap Multifactor Index ETF (FLQL); the Franklin Responsibly Sourced Gold ETF (FGDL); the Franklin High Yield Corporate ETF (FLHY); and the Franklin Income Equity Focus ETF (INCE). The products will be available through Ondo’s Global Markets platform.

Under the arrangement, Franklin Templeton continues to manage the underlying ETFs while Ondo provides tokenization infrastructure and digital distribution. Ondo will acquire shares of the ETFs and issue blockchain-based tokens representing their economic exposure — tokens that do not grant direct ownership of the underlying shares but instead pass through returns to holders. That structure opens the door to DeFi use cases, such as on-chain collateralization, that are not available with traditional fund shares.

The tokenized ETFs will initially be available in Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, and Latin America, with U.S. availability contingent on further regulatory clarity around how third parties can distribute registered funds on-chain.

The structure bypasses the need for a brokerage account, targeting crypto-native investors who hold assets primarily in wallets and stablecoins. Liquidity will be supported by Ondo’s market makers, including during periods when traditional markets are closed, enabling around-the-clock trading.

The deal also represents a significant expansion for Ondo Global Markets, which launched in September 2025 with over 100 tokenized U.S. stocks and ETFs on Ethereum. Since then, the platform has grown into the largest tokenized securities platform by TVL, with over $700 million locked, according to DeFiLlama.

The Franklin Templeton tie-up adds a new dimension: rather than tokenizing individual equities, Ondo is now wrapping actively managed funds from a top-tier asset manager, offering diversified exposure through a single token.

Ondo’s Rapid Rise

Ondo Finance’s overall TVL stands at roughly $2.7 billion, according to DeFiLlama. The protocol first crossed $1 billion in March 2025 following the launch of Ondo Nexus, and broke through $2 billion less than a year later in January 2026. Ethereum remains the dominant network for Ondo’s tokenized assets, with Solana and BNB Chain accounting for smaller shares.

The platform also received a regulatory boost in late 2025, when the SEC closed a multi-year investigation into Ondo Finance without bringing charges.

The ONDO token is trading at approximately $0.26 with a market cap of about $1.2 billion, according to CoinGecko, down more than 85% from its all-time high of $2.14 in December 2024.

This article was written with the assistance of AI workflows. All our stories are curated, edited and fact-checked by a human.