Hatching, Alliances, and Promotions: The Big Bet of Robinhood on Web3

Author: Gu Yu, ChainCatcher

On July 1, 2026, at the Old Royal Naval College in London, internet brokerage giant Robinhood held a milestone-themed launch event titled "The World is Flat." At this event, the [Robinhood Chain](https://www.rootdata.com/zh/Projects/detail/Robinhood Chain?k=MjUxOTU= "AI Native Layer2") public mainnet officially went live, Stock Tokens were fully opened, Agentic Accounts were launched for U.S. crypto users, and Robinhood Earn was simultaneously unveiled. On the same day, the company's stock price rose by 8.35%.

This was not just an update of crypto products. From the initial launch of cryptocurrency trading in 2018 to the introduction of its own Layer 2 public chain today, Robinhood has completed a full path from exploration to deep immersion. This path reflects the paradigm shift of traditional financial giants from observing and engaging with the crypto world to fully integrating into it. Robinhood is precisely the most dissectible sample on this evolutionary curve.

Phase One: Initial Entry into Crypto ------ From Trading Function to Own Wallet

Robinhood's first intersection with cryptocurrency began in 2018. At that time, this internet brokerage, which disrupted the U.S. securities brokerage industry with "zero commissions," launched cryptocurrency trading features within its app. At that time, this felt more like a natural extension of product boundaries—users could trade stocks, options, and cryptocurrencies within the same account, forming a preliminary one-stop experience.

However, the initial positioning of the crypto business was quite conservative. Robinhood only listed 15 types of crypto assets on its platform and never offered staking services. This caution stemmed from regulatory uncertainties—at that time, the U.S. SEC's regulatory framework for crypto assets was still unclear, and Robinhood chose to test the waters with a minimal asset list, satisfying user demand while keeping compliance risks within manageable limits.

Further progress occurred around 2022. Robinhood launched its own cryptocurrency wallet, marking an upgrade of its crypto layout from "trading channel" to "asset entry." The launch of the wallet meant that users could no longer just buy and sell crypto assets on the Robinhood platform but had true on-chain autonomy—assets could be deposited, transferred, and even participate in a broader DeFi ecosystem.

The significance of this phase lies in "positioning." Robinhood took four years to complete the construction of its crypto infrastructure from scratch. Although the functions were relatively basic, it laid the groundwork for subsequent comprehensive expansion. More importantly, through the wallet product, Robinhood accumulated experience in on-chain user operations, establishing a cognitive foundation for its future public chain strategy.

Phase Two: Embracing Crypto ------ Acquisitions, Investments, and Ecological Alliances

If the first phase was "testing the waters," then from 2024 to 2025, Robinhood truly jumped into the pool.

The most iconic event was the announcement in June 2024 of a $200 million cash acquisition of the established compliant exchange Bitstamp. This transaction was completed in the first half of 2025. Founded in 2011, Bitstamp is one of the most compliant exchanges in the industry, with operations in Luxembourg, the UK, Singapore, and the U.S., holding over 50 global crypto licenses. After the acquisition, the number of crypto assets supported by Robinhood expanded from 15 in the U.S. and over 30 in Europe to more than 85 from Bitstamp.

More importantly, Bitstamp brought institutional trading channels to Robinhood—90% of its trading volume comes from institutional users, charging an average fee of 5 basis points per transaction. This means that Robinhood's crypto business no longer only serves retail investors but has entered the higher-margin institutional market.

Almost simultaneously, Robinhood also announced the acquisition of the Canadian platform WonderFi to expand into the North American market. While expanding internationally, Robinhood's business coverage in Europe grew from 4 countries to 30.

On the investment front, Robinhood participated in Lighter's $68 million financing at the end of 2025. Lighter is an on-chain perpetual and spot exchange founded by Vladimir Novakovski in 2022, with this round led by Peter Thiel's Founders Fund and Ribbit Capital, achieving a post-investment valuation of approximately $1.5 billion. Robinhood entered as an investor rather than just a business partner—this represents a deeper binding of interests.

In terms of products, in June 2025, Robinhood launched Stock Tokens in the EU, allowing users to trade tokenized versions of over 200 U.S. stocks and ETFs. This product marked the beginning of Robinhood's attempt to "tokenize" traditional financial assets.

During this phase, Robinhood's crypto business began to contribute significant financial data. In the second quarter of 2025, the company's cryptocurrency trading revenue reached $160 million, a year-on-year increase of 98%, with trading volume hitting $35 billion. In the third quarter of 2025, cryptocurrency trading revenue further increased to $268 million, a year-on-year growth of 339%, with trading volume reaching $80 billion. The crypto business has become the core engine of Robinhood's performance growth.

The strategic logic of this phase is clear: acquire compliance licenses and institutional clients through acquisitions, bind core ecological partners through investments, and explore the possibilities of asset tokenization through product innovation. Robinhood no longer positions itself as a "stock trading app with crypto features," but rather begins to systematically build a comprehensive financial platform covering retail and institutional, spot and derivatives, traditional assets and crypto assets.

Phase Three: Deep Layout ------ Robinhood Chain and the Ambition of "Everything Exchange"

On July 1, 2026, Robinhood reached a critical moment in its crypto strategy—the Robinhood Chain public mainnet officially went live.

This Layer 2 network is built on the Arbitrum technology stack, aimed at tokenizing real-world assets (RWA) and DeFi applications, and is "very suitable for meme coins" (as stated by Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev).

The launch of Robinhood Chain marks an upgrade of Robinhood's crypto strategy from "connector" to "builder."

In recent years, a common way for financial companies to enter the crypto industry has been to connect to existing public chains—platforms handle users, interfaces, and product packaging, while underlying settlement, gas, liquidity, and DeFi applications occur on external networks. This model is quick to launch, but for Robinhood, which already has nearly 28 million funded accounts, the long-term pain point is that users are in their own app, but assets and settlements are on someone else's territory.

Robinhood Chain was born to solve this contradiction. It allows Robinhood to transition from "interface provider" to "owner of the financial track"—trading, settlement, collateral, yield, and asset flow all operate on its own chain.

A complete ecosystem is taking shape around Robinhood Chain. On the first day of its launch, dozens of crypto projects, including Uniswap, Chainlink, Lighter, 0x, LI.FI, and Rialto, announced integration with Robinhood Chain, while dYdX directly abandoned its original brand to launch a new perpetual exchange called Arcus. Reports indicate that the scale of Robinhood Chain's stablecoin reached $246.97 million.

At the same time, Stock Tokens were fully opened, allowing users to trade tokenized stocks in over 120 countries through the Robinhood Wallet. Robinhood Earn allows users to lend USDG stablecoins through self-custody wallets, with an expected annual yield of about 7%. Agentic Accounts allow qualified users to connect AI models to Robinhood's trading infrastructure.

At this point, Robinhood has gradually integrated stocks, cryptocurrencies, tokenized assets, stablecoin yields, perpetual futures, prediction markets, and AI trading tools into the same financial account system.

CEO Vlad Tenev revealed that the company currently has 9 product lines with annual revenues reaching hundreds of millions, covering stock trading, options, cryptocurrencies, Robinhood Gold subscriptions, cash management, instant withdrawals, tokenization, private banking, and prediction markets.

This company, which was once primarily identified as a zero-commission brokerage, is evolving into the ultimate form of "everything exchange."

A Sample of the Integration of Traditional Finance and the Crypto World

It is noteworthy that as Robinhood launched its own public chain, crypto-native exchanges like Coinbase and Binance were also actively promoting the launch of tokenized stocks, attempting to bring traditional stock trading on-chain. Meanwhile, Robinhood is making deep inroads into the crypto field through its self-built public chain, launching perpetual contracts and DeFi tools.

These two paths are approaching the same goal from opposite directions: allowing users to complete trading, holding, and yield acquisition of both traditional and crypto assets within the same system.

More importantly, Robinhood's path reveals an increasingly clear industry trend: traditional financial institutions entering the crypto world are not merely looking to connect to an existing ecosystem, but hope to leverage their years of accumulated compliance capabilities, brand reputation, user base, and global channels to rebuild their own financial systems on-chain. This poses a significant threat to existing crypto giants.

From the cautious listing of coins in 2018 to the self-built public chain in 2026, Robinhood has completed a "reverse takeover" of the crypto world in eight years. Its journey reveals an unavoidable conclusion: when the massive ships of traditional finance sail into the deep sea of crypto, what they aim to do is not to integrate into the existing on-chain world, but to rebuild a new continent beneath their feet with compliance structures and a vast user base. This posture of leveraging users to dictate protocols may become the main narrative of the integration of traditional finance and crypto in the next decade.