The war for the future of finance is heating up.
Tokenised shares have become the latest battlefield in this power struggle, with Kraken and Backed Finance firing off another salvo against rival Robinhood on Wednesday by expanding the xStocks offering to Binance’s BNB Chain.
For David Henderson, head of growth at Backed Finance, the company behind xStocks, the latest expansion highlights the tension between native crypto companies and their fintech challengers as they fight over customers.
“The question is who is going to be able to integrate them the best — do you trust the traditional finance company that’s doing crypto, or do you trust the crypto company that’s trying to do traditional finance?” Henderson told DL News.
“Crypto exchanges have always been at the absolute forefront of making user experience better and integrating interesting products.”
The news comes as several players, both in crypto and traditional finance, are jostling for advantage when it comes to tokenised stocks as well as the tokenisation of other real world assets like real estate, commodities, and invoices.
And for good reason. Tokenised assets will skyrocket to $19 trillion in 2033 from roughly $600 billion in April, according to projections made by Ripple and Boston Consulting Group.
It’s a battle that some say may even put traditional stock exchanges out of business — or at least rapidly reduce their roles in the financial ecosystem.
BNB Chain
Having already launched xStocks on Solana, the latest expansion will see it integrated with BNB Chain, a blockchain with a DeFi market size of more than $6 billion, according to DefiLlama.
Kraken users will be able to deposit and withdraw tokenised shares of companies like Tesla, Nvidia, and Apple on the Binance-linked blockchain.
When asked whether that means that the companies are exploring offering xStocks products on Binance, Henderson told DL News that it was in talks with multiple exchanges.
He didn’t provide any details about those talks.
Henderson said some exchanges are already leveraging the permissionless nature of xStocks to deploy tokenised stocks on their platform without necessarily partnering with Backed Finance.
“Some exchanges have even adopted the tokens without even asking [Backed Finance] because these are permissionless assets and they can go to a market maker that’s already onboarded with us and spin up an order book,” Henderson said.
In a separate interview, Kraken said its working with “a broad network of partners to expand xStocks to additional blockchains.”
“The xStocks approach isn’t about creating another wall-garden — it’s about catalysing momentum for tokenised equities to stand on their own,” a Kraken spokesperson said.
“xStocks are chain-agnostic by design and expanding rapidly. We believe in supporting all chains and all communities — yes, even our competitors.”
The comments represent shots across the bow against Robinhood.
The trading platform debuted tokenised stock trading to users in Europe in June. The platform lets users trade stock tokens on the Arbitrum blockchain but has plans to deploy its own layer 2 blockchain in the future.
Henderson said blockchain-agnostic tokenised trading will be better for users than offerings “siloed to one company’s app.”
Robinhood didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Crowded space
The tokenised asset space is getting crowded.
Coinbase, the crypto exchange, has approached the US Securities and Exchange Commission for approval to offer tokenised stocks. Elsewhere, DeFi protocol Ondo Finance acquired SEC-regulated broker Oasis Pro.
Banks are also entering the market with JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, and Citigroup among major Wall Street incumbents set to launch stablecoin and tokenisation platforms.
This may change stock-trading at its core, according to Galaxy Digital.
The crypto firm’s analysts warned that legacy firms risked being reduced to “mere custodians” as fintech and crypto-native disruptors move into tokenised equities.
Crypto market movers
Bitcoin is up 0.6% over the past 24 hours to trade at $108,831.
Eterheum is up 3.1% to trade at $2,629.
What we’re reading
Why Ethereum is a stronger corporate treasury play than Bitcoin, according to analyst — DL News
TON Foundation Clarifies UAE Golden Visa Project Was Not Government-Backed — Unchained
The problem with crypto infrastructure — Milk Road
ReserveOne, backed by crypto heavyweights, set to raise over $1 billion in Nasdaq listing — Reuters
‘Frontier’ Ethereum Whale Wallets Move Millions After Decade — Unchained
Wall Street’s crypto push puts fractional reserve stablecoins in play, analysts say — DL News
Osato Avan-Nomayo is our Nigeria-based DeFi correspondent. He covers DeFi and tech. Got a tip? Please contact him [email protected].
