Gate Research: The "Wall Street-ification" Wave of Crypto Financial Products – Competition or Integration?

In January 2009, Satoshi Nakamoto embedded a line in Bitcoin's genesis block: "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks." This served both as a timestamp and is often seen as a critique of the bank bailout system following the 2008 financial crisis: Bitcoin aimed to establish a peer-to-peer value transfer system that does not rely on banks or trusted third parties.

Yet, seventeen years later, one of the mainstream ways to hold Bitcoin is by buying shares of an ETF issued by BlackRock, the world's largest asset manager, or holding stocks in companies holding Bitcoin treasuries. Does this mean the crypto market has deviated from its original intention? Is Wall Street systematically seizing the rights to issue, price, custody, and distribute crypto financial assets?

1. Is Wall Street Seizing the Rights to Issue, Price, Custody, and Distribute Crypto Assets?

1.1 The Ideal: Bitcoin’s Founding Intention in 2009

This brings us back to Bitcoin's founding principle. The Bitcoin whitepaper envisioned a financial order built around three core tenets of decentralization:

• Decentralization: No central issuer, no headquarters, no server that can be shut down. The ledger is maintained by global nodes, with rules encoded in software.

• Disintermediation: Value transfers directly peer-to-peer, without needing banks, brokers, or clearinghouses for matching and endorsement. "Private keys are ownership," and self-custody is the default state.

• Debanking: Anyone can hold and transfer assets, or participate in new coin issuance (through mining) without needing an account, KYC, or accredited investor status.

The spiritual core of this ideal is to reclaim the four powers of finance—issuance, pricing, custody, and distribution—from a few institutions and distribute them among every participant in the network. This was a direct response to the 2008 financial crisis and a declaration to the market: if the centralized financial system can fail, then build a system that doesn't need it.

1.2 The Reality: Are These Four Powers Being Seized?

However, this decentralized order seems less pure following the approval of Bitcoin spot ETFs in 2024. In other words, traditional finance is incorporating crypto technology into its own asset issuance, settlement, and distribution systems.

Asset management giants like BlackRock, Fidelity, and Franklin Templeton have packaged BTC and ETH into products purchasable within traditional financial accounts. When BTC and ETH are packaged into ETFs, they transform from "on-chain assets requiring understanding of wallets and private keys" into "financial products purchasable in a traditional securities account." As of May 2026, ETFs hold approximately 1.5 million Bitcoin, representing about 7.14% of Bitcoin's total capped supply of 21 million coins in just two years.

Similar changes are occurring in the derivatives market. CME's Bitcoin and Ethereum futures and options provide institutions with a regulated trading venue for hedging and risk management. Increasingly, institutions can gain crypto exposure through futures, options, ETFs, structured products, and fund shares without directly touching on-chain assets.

RWA and tokenized Treasuries further expand the boundaries of "Wall Street-ification." The RWA Treasury market grew from approximately $380 million in early 2023 to over $11 billion in 2026, becoming the fastest-growing segment in the entire RWA space, with the issuer list reading almost like a Wall Street roster. BlackRock's BUIDL, Franklin Templeton's Benji, JPMorgan's Kinexys, and Ondo's tokenized Treasury products are all bringing traditional financial assets onto the blockchain.

Institutions like Coinbase, Fidelity Digital Assets, and BNY Mellon provide custody, trading, and compliance infrastructure. Furthermore, in August 2025, a US executive order allowed alternative assets like cryptocurrencies and private equity to enter 401(k) retirement plans, opening the door to approximately $12.5 trillion in retirement account funds for crypto assets. As institutional participation grows, many brokerages and wealth management firms are gradually incorporating some distribution rights.

Behind this are not just product form changes but shifts in power structure: asset managers handle issuance, brokerages and advisors handle distribution, compliant custodians handle safekeeping, market makers and authorized participants handle primary market creation/redemption, exchanges handle listing, and the regulatory framework defines the boundaries. Crypto assets have thus entered the language system of traditional finance.

2. A Two-Way Convergence: 1+1>2

But Wall Street's "centralization" is only one side of the coin. Zooming out, the other side shows both parties complementing each other's weaknesses. This is not a zero-sum game of one absorbing the other, but a two-way convergence of two systems.

The crypto-native system offers permissionless openness, a 24/7 global market, and programmable on-chain settlement. However, it has always lacked four things: compliant issuance channels, institutional-grade custodial trust, deep fiat liquidity, and distribution networks reaching mainstream audiences. These four things are precisely what Wall Street has in abundance.

Conversely, Wall Street has licenses, custody, trillions in capital pools, and global distribution channels. But its assets are trapped in an outdated system: markets only open on weekdays, high cross-border barriers, T+2 settlement, and products that cannot be freely combined. These limitations are exactly what crypto rails can inherently solve. Therefore, this 1+1>2 is not just a theoretical concept.

Recently, crypto exchanges have started listing real stock trading. This wave perfectly illustrates two opposing directions that converge at the same endpoint. One starts from a crypto exchange, moving towards traditional finance; the other starts from traditional finance, moving towards crypto. Gate and Robinhood are the clearest representatives of these two paths.

2.1 Path A: From CEX to Traditional Finance

Gate’s TradFi path can be divided into stages. The first stage was tokenization of traditional assets. On July 3, 2025, Gate officially launched the xStocks Trading Section, becoming one of the first crypto exchanges to offer tokenized asset trading. Partnering with xStocks and Ondo, it allowed users to trade spot and perpetual contracts for US stocks like Apple, Tesla, and Meta using USDT, 24/7, without needing a traditional securities account. The core of this path is the "third-party compliant issuance + CEX distribution" model represented by xStocks. The underlying structure involves Swiss compliant institution Backed Finance, under the DLT law, holding 1:1 real stocks via an SPV structure (bought through brokers like Interactive Brokers, custodied at regulated custodians like InCore Bank). Tokens were issued on the SPL standard on Solana, incorporating Chainlink price feeds for high-frequency synchronization with off-chain markets.

The second stage was CFD-ification of traditional assets, providing users with price exposure to gold, forex, indices, commodities, and some stocks via Contracts for Difference. In January 2026, Gate expanded its TradFi CFD products to cover gold, forex, indices, commodities, and popular stocks, using USDx as an internal unit pegged to USDT for the trading experience. At this stage, the exchange acted as a price exposure provider; users traded derivatives without directly holding the underlying stock assets.

The third stage was launching real stock trading in June 2026. Gate officially launched real stock trading on June 1, currently supporting over 10,000 US stocks and ETFs covering major markets like NYSE and Nasdaq, allowing users to trade directly with USDT. This means a native crypto trading platform is no longer satisfied with providing spot, derivatives, Launchpad, copy trading, wallet, and on-chain tools for native users but begins incorporating traditional securities traders like stocks, ETFs, bonds, forex, and funds into its trading landscape.

The key difference from the previous CFD stage is that Gate emphasizes connecting to real securities markets through compliant brokerage infrastructure, rather than stock tokens or synthetic assets. Gate also announced a strategic partnership with Alpaca on June 3 to expand real stock trading access for qualified users. Alpaca is an SEC-registered clearing broker, with the partnership focusing on trade execution, clearing, and custody infrastructure. In other words, Gate does not issue stocks itself but acts as a front-end interface connecting crypto accounts and stablecoin funds with the traditional broker clearing system.

The fourth stage is the geographical expansion of the stock market. After launching US stocks, Gate introduced Hong Kong stock trading on June 15, initially covering over 1,000 stocks listed on HKEX. Users could trade HK stocks like Tencent, HSBC, Xiaomi, Meituan, BYD, and China Mobile using USDT, sharing the same stock account system as US stocks. On June 22, Gate further launched South Korean stock trading, supporting stocks listed on KRX, initially covering the top 1,000 companies by market cap including Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, NAVER, Hyundai Motor, and Celltrion, covering both the KOSPI and KOSDAQ markets. Within June, Gate rapidly deployed a multi-market product matrix using USDT as the unified capital entry point and global stocks as allocation targets.

These four stages reflect the changing growth logic of CEXs. Previously, CEXs mainly relied on spot, derivatives, Launchpad, wealth management, and Web3 wallets to build user ecosystems. However, as crypto trading penetration increases, fee competition intensifies, and regulatory requirements rise, growth space solely dependent on crypto-to-crypto trading is narrowing. Traditional assets like stocks, ETFs, and commodities can expand the tradable asset pool and improve user asset retention. For Gate, real stock trading can serve the cross-asset allocation needs of crypto users and help attract traditional finance users into its account system.

2.2 Path B: From Traditional Finance to the Crypto Space

Opposite to Gate's direction, traditional brokerages like Robinhood are also gradually penetrating the crypto market. Their advantage lies in having a mature securities brokerage user base, compliance framework, and retail trading product experience. This allows them to integrate traditional financial products like stocks, ETFs, and options with crypto assets on the same trading platform at a lower customer acquisition cost. Traditional financial institutions are not just adding crypto assets as a supplement to their wealth management system; they are leveraging crypto's 24/7 trading and high volatility to develop new revenue streams and enhance platform competitiveness.

The most representative traditional brokerage is Robinhood. Originally a typical retail brokerage and fintech platform starting with stocks, options, cash management, margin, and subscription services, crypto assets have become a key growth engine in recent years. In Q4 2024, Robinhood's crypto trading revenue reached $358 million, a year-over-year increase of over 700%, driving total trading revenue up over 200% year-over-year. For the full year 2025, Robinhood's total revenue was $4.5 billion, with net deposits of $68 billion for the year and 4.2 million Gold subscribers, showing its transformation from a single stock trading app to a comprehensive financial account.

Robinhood's crypto strategy extends beyond simply listing coins for trading. In June 2025, Robinhood completed its acquisition of Bitstamp, integrating Bitstamp's retail and institutional crypto trading businesses covering the EU, UK, US, and Asia, and strengthening its global crypto licenses and institutional business capabilities. This shows Robinhood is not just treating crypto as another trading category in its stock app but is actively building comprehensive crypto exchange, licensing, institutional client, and global operational capabilities through acquisitions.

More importantly, it is putting traditional stock assets on-chain. On June 30, 2025, Robinhood announced the launch of Stock Tokens in Europe and disclosed plans to build the Robinhood Layer 2, designed to support real-world asset tokenization, 24/7 trading, cross-chain functionality, and self-custody. Its stock tokens were initially issued on Arbitrum, with future plans to migrate to Robinhood's own Layer 2 based on the Arbitrum technology stack. These Classic Stock Tokens are derivative contracts with Robinhood reflecting the price performance of the underlying stocks and ETPs.

This contrasts with Gate's emphasis on real stock trading. Robinhood leans more towards packaging traditional stock exposure as on-chain or quasi-on-chain tokenized exposure, while Gate starts from its CEX account to connect with real securities brokerage infrastructure.

2.3 Common Goal of Both Paths: Competing for the Next-Generation Comprehensive Financial Account

For ordinary users, the financial classification of an asset may not be that important. Most people don't care whether they are trading stocks, cryptocurrencies, ETFs, event contracts, or tokenized securities. What users truly care about is whether they can trade within a single account, enter and exit at low cost, see price changes in real-time, and quickly switch positions during market volatility.

This is precisely the core motivation for traditional brokerages to embrace crypto assets. They are not simply trying to become another Gate or CEX but hope to prevent the next-generation financial gateway from being captured by crypto platforms.

Therefore, the key is not whether a particular product succeeds in the short term, but that the direction of industry convergence is very clear. Traditional brokerages want crypto's trading speed, global liquidity, younger user base, and high-frequency trading behavior. Crypto platforms want traditional finance's real assets, compliant identity, institutional trust, and broader asset supply.

Both sides are moving towards each other's most valuable parts. The boundary between Crypto and TradFi is being broken down at the product level. The next stage of competition will center on compliance capabilities, asset coverage, capital efficiency, user experience, and global account systems.

3. RWA and On-Chain Treasuries: An Intermediary Layer for Unifying Capital Markets

Gate and Robinhood mentioned above represent convergence at the user entry point, while RWA and on-chain Treasuries represent convergence at the asset layer.

Historically, a major problem for the crypto market was the relatively closed supply of on-chain assets. Besides native tokens, stablecoins, NFTs, and a few derivative assets, it was difficult for the chain to host sufficiently rich, low-volatility, institutionally suitable real-yield assets.

On-chain Treasuries changed this. When US Treasury bonds, money market funds, and short-term bond funds are tokenized, they become approximations of "risk-free returns" in the on-chain world. They can serve as collateral, participate in DeFi portfolios, service institutional treasury management, and become the yield source behind stablecoins and on-chain financial products.

However, this market is still in its early stages. Data from May 2026 shows the tokenized US Treasury market is around $15 billion, while the entire US Treasury market is about $30 trillion. The gap between them is over three orders of magnitude.

This gap illustrates two things. First, RWA is not a completed market but one just beginning to institutionalize. Second, its ceiling is not with crypto-native users, but with whether traditional financial assets can enter the on-chain environment in a compliant, auditable, settleable, and distributable manner. This is why traditional institutions like JPMorgan, BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, BNY, DTCC, and Nasdaq appear simultaneously in the tokenization narrative. Long-term, they are not just making a standalone crypto product; they are testing the underlying settlement and asset registration methods for future capital markets.

Data proves this convergence is not a narrative bubble but a real structural trend. In the first half of 2026, the overall crypto market fell by 28%, and DeFi TVL shrank over 25%. Yet, the RWA sector bucked the trend, growing over 40% and surpassing $32 billion in total value. Tokenized stocks were the growth engine: the number of holding wallets increased by 188% in six months to approximately 350,000, making it the largest RWA category by wallet count, surpassing tokenized gold. This means a large number of users originally in the crypto world who wanted US stock exposure found an entry point without returning to traditional brokers. Meanwhile, DTCC and banks in the US and Japan plan to enter the market in 2026-2027, aiming to make tokenized stocks "infrastructural."

4. The Logical Endpoint: Stocks, Crypto, RWA, and On-Chain Treasuries Trading Together

4.1 Unified Capital Market and the "Super Account"

In the old financial system, different assets were separated into different accounts: stocks in brokerage accounts, funds in asset management accounts, bonds in institutional systems, deposits in bank accounts, crypto on exchanges or wallets, on-chain assets in self-custodial addresses. Each type of asset had its own trading hours, settlement cycles, custody rules, compliance requirements, and user interfaces. New-generation platforms are trying to compress this fragmentation into a single account.

Crypto exchanges are starting from coins, expanding into stocks, ETFs, RWA, payments, and on-chain yields. Traditional brokerages are starting from stocks, expanding into crypto, tokenized securities, prediction markets, stablecoins, and 24/7 trading. Asset management firms are starting from funds, expanding into ETFs, tokenized funds, and on-chain distribution. Banks are starting from deposits and settlement, expanding into tokenized deposits, on-chain payments, and institutional clearing networks.

Superficially, they seem to be making different products. In reality