Terry Duffy, chairman and chief executive  of CME Group, said the group’s strong business performance has been overshadowed by discussions surrounding perpetual futures.

On 29 May 2026 the Commodity Futures Trading Commission said in a statement that it had approved the listing of the BTCPERP contract, a perpetual contract that references the spot price of bitcoin, as futures listed on designated contract market KalshiEX. A perpetual contract never ends, and tracks the spot rate of the underlying asset through a funding rate. CME has since filed a lawsuit against  the CFTC claiming that the regulator’s decision was wrong.

On CME’s second quarter results call on 22 July 2026 Duffy said that while this product may be dubbed futures, they function much more like swaps.

Terrence Duffy, CME Group

“They may appeal to certain retail traders seeking high leverage, but they are not appropriate for the institutional risk managers who comprise the vast majority of our business,” Duffy added.

Perpetual futures are highly engineered instruments that rely on frequent funding rate adjustments that revert the position back to the spot price and are known for high leverage and automated liquidations, according to Duffy. In addition, he said they offer limited investor protections and introduce heightened market risk, particularly for retail participants.

Nearly all, 94%, of CME’s volume originated from institutional customers in the first half of 2026 according to Duffy.

“Perpetual futures are in no way substitutes for the institutional hedging tools that these customers rely on,” he added. “Perpetuals do not provide price or time certainty, two necessary components for hedging exposures.”

Duffy gave the example of speaking to the second largest energy commercial participant in the world and they said they doing do not want  perpetual futures, as they cannot be used to risk manage the exposures on their books.

“They made it quite clear to me that the energy contracts that are available to them, whether it is at CME or somewhere else, are critically important to how they manage their business,” he added. “Trading  around a leveraged spot price does absolutely nothing for them in order to risk manage their product.”

He continued that he had similar conversations related to CME’s other products, such as rates and equities derivatives. In addition, Duffy argued that the total cost of trading perpetual futures is typically “orders of magnitude” more expensive than using CME’s futures when taking into account both the transaction fee and the daily funding cost.

Duffy said CME has the full technical and operational capabilities to launch perpetual futures.

“In fact, we have contract specifications and are prepared to bring these products to market should evolving demand or structural shifts make it appropriate to use them,” he added. “However, we have not heard demand from our customers for these products.”

Crypto derivatives

Crypto perpetuals are not new and Duffy highlighted that they existed before CME launched its crypto futures complex in 2017.

“We have built that business over the last nine years because our futures fill a market need that was not met by traditional crypto products, including perpetuals,” Duffy added. “Our crypto futures volume is up over sevenfold in the past three years and we will never sacrifice core protections in the name of innovation.”

Second quarter cryptocurrency ADV was up 32% year-on-year to 250,000 contracts, or $7.4bn, despite the fall in crypto prices. CME also launched several new crypto contracts including Avalanche, Sui Bitcoin volatility futures (launched 1 June ) and Nasdaq CME Crypto Index futures (launched 8 June).

Tim McCourt, CME

CME’s crypto contracts went live for 24/7 trading on Friday 29 May 2026. Over $1.5bn traded over the first eight weekends, according to Tim McCourt, global head of equities, FX and alternative products at CME Group.

On 24 July 2026 CME’s existing 1-Oz gold futures will also begin trading 24/7. However, the CFTC stopped CME launching 24/7 trading of its existing crude oil contract. Duffy said: “We didn’t see anything novel or complex in our oil contract. I am a little surprised.”

He highlighted there is 24/7 oil being traded today by entities that are supposedly not allowed to have U.S. participants, but the market has yet to see how the federal government is policing this and prediction markets trade oil contracts 24/7.

McCourt said on the call that CME Group trades between $4.5bn and $6.5bn per day in its cryptocurrency complex versus about $270m for Kalshi’s bitcoin perpetual. In addition, CME had about $9bn and $10bn of average daily open interest in the complex for June and July.

“I think these numbers speak for themselves and we have an almost nine-year growth trajectory of serving the retail community,” McCourt added. “Along with the introduction of additional cryptocurrency futures and the introduction of 24×7 trading, we think the retail community in crypto is adequately served alongside the institutional community of clients at CME.”

Single stock futures

Duffy said: “We also continue to innovate a number of new tools to help clients manage risk and pursue opportunities, including single-stock futures, 1-ounce gold contracts being available 24/7, U.S. Treasury clearing and compute futures. We expect our innovative new offerings to further accelerate our growth as we build on our record-breaking performance in the first half of 2026.”

CME is due to launch single stock futures across more than 50 of the top U.S. stocks on July 27, pending regulatory review. The new offering will include 55 larger-sized and 22 micro-sized futures contracts.

Duffy said: “I’m probably the only one old enough to remember that when we first launched single stock futures they failed miserably. Sometimes timing is really important when you list products, and I will say timing is massively critical right now as we also get ready to list compute futures.”

CME argued that the world has changed since 2000 when the the group first tried to launch single stock futures due to increased participation in equity markets, the increased knowledge of retail investors and increased access for global investors on CME Globex.

Compute futures

In May this year CME said in a statement it is working with Silicon Data, which provides GPU market intelligence and benchmarks, and trading firm DRW to launch a compute futures market later this year, pending regulatory review.

Don Wilson, founder and chief executive of DRW, said in a statement that compute will become the largest commodity in the world.

“The exponential growth in spending on data centers as we move towards that reality has been hampered by the lack of a hedging vehicle,” Wilson added. “The launch of a compute futures market is an important solution to that problem that can help market participants manage price volatility and plan with greater certainty.”

Derek Sammann, CME Group

Derek Sammann, global head of commodities markets at CME, said on the call that computer futures allow customers to manage their risk and price certainty around their data center business.

“It’s going to provide a mechanism for financing for a lot of these companies,” added Sammann. “There’s no real price discovery mechanism and that is the business that we are in, whether it’s agricultural, equities or energy.”

Julie Winkler, chief commercial officer at CME Group, said on the call that retail brokers globally are extremely excited about this new product innovation. She added: “They are seeing it as the single biggest retail growth catalyst of the year and we have over 35 retail partners that are targeting the readiness for week one.”

Treasury Link

On 8 July 2026 CME said in a statement that it will launch Treasury Link to connect U.S. Treasury futures and cash liquidity pools in the fourth quarter of 2026, pending regulatory review. The new service will enable transparent, centralized spread trading between CBOT Treasury futures and BrokerTec cash Treasuries on CME Globex.

Reed Staub, head of NA futures execution at Morgan Stanley, said in a statement: “The introduction of Treasury Link removes a significant variable – legging risk – from the equation, and represents a major leap forward in market structure efficiency.”

Treasury Link builds on the recent launch of BrokerTec Chicago, a second BrokerTec central limit order book (CLOB) targeting relative value traders. BrokerTec Chicago is co-located in the Aurora data center next to CME Group’s U.S. Treasury futures and options market. BrokerTec Chicago reached a single-day volume record of $1.2bn on 8 April 2026.

Source: CME Group

Volumes

Lynne Fitzpatrick, president and chief financial officer at CME Group, said on the call that ADV of 29.8 million contracts was the second highest Q2 in CME’s history.

Volume was within 1% of the record second quarter of 2025 with May and June particularly strong. May had a record ADV of 33.2 million contracts, up 15%, from a year ago and June had a record 30.6 million contracts, an increase of 19% over the same period.

Source: CME Group

Open interest rose 8% year-over-year 16% from 2025 year end, to 127 million contracts. Interest rates and equity index asset classes hit large open interest holders (LOIH) records during  the second quarter.

CME delivered record first half performance across revenue, adjusted operating income, adjusted net income and adjusted earnings per share, which were powered by record trading in the first quarter and the second-highest second volumes ever. Revenue of $3.6bn for the first half of this year was up 8% year-on-year and adjusted operating income increased 8% from a year ago to a record $2.6bn.

Lynne Fitzpatrick, CME

Fitzpatrick will become chief executive on 1 March 2027 when Duffy transitions to the role of executive chairman. She has been at CME for about 20 years and worked closely with Duffy on strategic  M&A transactions and partnerships.

“My vision for the firm is not a strong departure from what we’ve delivered over the last 20 years,” she added. “I think we have done well in terms of staying with what we are good at, running a world-class exchange, and looking for ways to bring on more product, more customers, and create more capital efficiencies for those clients.”

Kalshi hired Andy Ross as head of institutional in March this year to link with technology and middleware firms, set up a data business and convert banks and asset managers to trade on prediction markets.

His previous roles include financial markets UK head at Standard Chartered and working in the capital markets management team at London Stock Exchange Group. While at LSEG, Ross was chief executive of CurveGlobal, an interest rate derivatives venture between the exchange and a number of leading dealer banks, which ceased trading in January 2022.

Andy Ross, Kalshi

Ross told Markets Media that he joined Kalshi because it is a high growth start up and because prediction markets are “phenomenally interesting.” He described them as the “biggest change to financial markets since the eurodollar.”

“Prediction markets provide price signals and atomise risk in a way that did not exist before,” Ross added. “The wisdom of crowds means a trader does not need the fastest machine and they can build their own models.”

An example of this new price signal was shown in May this year when Target reported its first quarter results. The retailer reported  its  largest revenue beat since November 2021, but its share price dropped 8% when markets opened.

Jake DeMatteo, markets at Kalshi, said on LinkedIn: “Kalshi traders who called transactions above 2.5% at 5¢ locked in a 20x return – not because they timed the tape, but because they read the fundamentals correctly. Kalshi’s KPI markets let you take a direct position on the metric itself, stripped of sentiment, macro noise, and options Greeks.”

Ross added that Kalshi contracts are 90% accurate 90% of the time. For well-traded markets, once a contract has been traded roughly $40,000 – $60,000 and is a month from expiry, Kalshi prediction contracts have a Brier score of 0.05, so they are 95% right about 95% of the time, according to the firm. Brier scores are a widely used metric to measure the accuracy of probabilistic forecasts, with standard meteorological forecasting having a Brier score of 0.1.

Institutional interest

Kalshi said in a statement in May this year that it had raised $1bn, valuing the firm at $22bn, as institutional adoption accelerated. Over the previous six months, institutional trading volume had increased 800%, according to the statement.

The firm said it would use the new capital to scale adoption across hedge funds, asset managers, proprietary trading firms, and insurance companies and expand its product suite, including  block trading capabilities, risk products, and deeper broker integrations tailored to institutional demand.

One integration was announced in February this year when Tradeweb Markets, an operator of electronic marketplaces for rates, credit, equities, and money markets, said in a statement it will expand institutional access to Kalshi’s prediction market data and analytics, advance market infrastructure for prediction markets and also made a minority investment in Kalshi. The companies aim to integrate probabilistic, forward-looking risk signals directly into core trading workflows used by Tradeweb’s more than 3,000 institutional clients.

Billy Hult, Tradeweb

Billy Hult, chief executive of Tradeweb, said in a statement: “Prediction markets are increasingly becoming a key part of the trading landscape, and have the potential to become an indicator for institutions to dynamically assess macro risk and allocate capital more effectively.”

In terms of block trading, Ross said: “Jump Trading and Susquehanna have publicly announced they are working with us, along with many others.”

Galaxy Digital, the digital asset fund manager, said in a statement in June this year that it is launching an over-the-counter desk for event-driven markets. The first trade executed was a  $10m trade with crypto-native hedge fund Arca on Kalshi.

The asset manager’s global markets trading desk hosted a webinar on 10 June to discuss the growth in prediction markets and the increasing interest from institutions. Zane Glauber, global head of distribution at Galaxy, said on the webinar that prediction markets are the future of event-driven markets for institutions. Glauber said: “Prediction markets have gone from niche to mainstream, and the velocity of growth has been quite remarkable.”

Josh Barkhordar, FalconX

Market maker FalconX said in a statement in May this year that it will provide institutional clients with access to event-driven markets on Kalshi through structured derivatives and block trade execution.

Joshua Barkhordar, head of sales at FalconX, said in a statement that prediction markets are transforming how risk is priced and traded, turning real-world events into investable opportunities. Barkhordar said: “We see this as a natural evolution of financial markets, where institutional capital, derivatives infrastructure, and new asset classes converge. Our role is to bring the scale, liquidity, and risk management frameworks institutions expect into this emerging category.”

Low-latency trading is also important to attract institutions.In July this year CryptoStruct integrated Kalshi to power ultra-low-latency access to regulated prediction markets. CryptoStruct said in a statement that because Kalshi is normalized into the same format as every other venue it supports, firms can blend it with their existing feeds and run cross-venue strategies without extra integration work.

Ross added on LinkedIn: “Low latency is one of the milestones you pass as you grow the institutional side of the Kalshi exchange. My thanks for the partnership with CryptoStruct GmbH on this for mutual clients.”

In July this year LO:TECH became one of the first firms licensed to distribute Kalshi data. Ross said in a statement: “Access to event market contract data is essential for enabling institutional participants to manage and hedge risk more effectively.”

LO:TECH said the Kalshi data runs through the same infrastructure as its trading and liquidity operations, so it arrives in one consistent format rather than a set of raw feeds to stitch together. Tim Meggs, chief executive of LO:TECH, said on X: “People who have come to us for this sort of data are using it for research, they’re using it for post-trade analysis, they’re using it for generating trade ideas.

Volume growth

Institutional interest has been growing as volumes have been increasing in prediction markets, especially in non-sports contracts.

Venture capital firm a16zcrypto said in a blog that weekly prediction market volume reached a record $14.4bn in the week ending 21 June 2026, up from roughly $5bn to $6bn at the start of this year. a16zcrypto added: “Total volume across all platforms is now more than 10x what it was a year ago.”

Source: a16zcrypto

a16zcrypto added: “Total volume across all platforms is now more than 10x what it was a year ago.”

Non-sports volume across categories including politics, economics, geopolitics, and current events, reached $3.6bn on Kalshi and Polymarket combined in the same week, according to a16zcrypto.

“That’s larger than total prediction market volume (sports included) was just last year,” said a16zcrypto.

Risks

There have been allegations that prediction markets facilitate insider trading. Ross said traders have to complete full anti-money laundering/know your customer checks and in the U.S. they have to provide a social security number. He added: “We can get alerts if they trade contracts related to their employment.”

For example, there have been reports that the operator of President  Trump’s teleprompter is being investigated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission for placing bets that specific words or topics would appear in a speech. Kalshi’s own surveillance systems reportedly flagged the trading activity and reported the activity  to the CFTC.

In June this year Kalshi rolled out new market integrity measures based on the independent Surveillance Audit Committee’s first ever report.

In the same month Kalshi also partnered with StarCompliance, a provider of employee and firm compliance technology solutions. StarCompliance is expanding its digital asset and traditional security employee compliance framework, enabling firms to ensure compliance with policies by monitoring prediction market activity on Kalshi from one centralized compliance platform.

Kelvin Dickenson, chief product officer at StarCompliance, said in a statement that prediction markets represent a rapidly emerging area of employee conduct and misuse of material non-public information risk. He said: “As these markets evolve globally, firms need surveillance capabilities that adapt across jurisdictions and provide meaningful visibility into both onchain and off-chain prediction market activity.”

There have also been controversies over contracts not paying out when investors thought they had won and that prediction markets facilitate gambling.

“Contract design matters inside a regulated perimeter, for example, we do not pay out on deaths,” added Ross.

Tarek Mansour, Kalshi

Tarek  Mansour, chief executive of Kalshi, argued in a podcast with venture capital from Sequoia that the platform provides price discovery.

Mansour said: ‘There’s a price discovery aspect to this where you’re on an open, transparent exchange where people are trading against each other. That makes it a financial market and that’s why it needs to be regulated as a financial market.”

He argued that Kalshi’s incentive structure incentivizes people to do research.

“The more liquid, the better the forecast, the more truthful my forecast, the more people look at it, the more my top of funnel increases,” he added. “I want the smart traders, which is a very different structure from the casino, which wants continuous money-losing behavior.”

Mansour acknowledged there will be losers, but highlighted that people also lose money in traditional financial markets, and that Kalshi throttles accounts that lose too much money. In addition, he argued that everybody can win on Kalshi.

“It’s a fair and neutral platform, and my incentive is to give as many tools as possible for people to do the right thing and do research,” he added.” And what we do, and what we do really well, is we do take this sort of issue of excessive behaviors pretty seriously.”

A large number of asset managers and their servicers are positioned to serve retail demand for private markets, according to Sven Eggers, head of private markets, EMEA, at State Street.

State Street’s fifth annual Private Markets Study, Resilience Meets Opportunity, found that more than 84% of asset and wealth managers either already offer or plan to offer private markets strategies for individual investors.

Joerg Ambrosius, State Street

Joerg Ambrosius, president of investment services at State Street, said in a statement: “Demand remains strong but delivering private markets to a broader investor base at scale is fundamentally reshaping how the industry operates. Success will depend on who can manage complexity and deliver consistent outcomes across a much wider set of clients.”

The survey also found that as firms scale private markets strategies to individual investors, operational complexity is the defining challenge.

Nearly 80% of respondents cited liquidity management as a key challenge, with specific pressure points including redemption management, cash forecasting and liquidity stress testing as firms adapt to more dynamic investor flows. Compliance, reporting and investor servicing are also increasing as firms move beyond institutional client bases.

As a result, Eggers argued that investors have more trust in the larger managers in terms of their technical capabilities, liquidity stress testing and handling and generally their more advanced capabilities.

In order to meet increased demand from individual investors, State Street’s investment roadmap focuses on two large buckets.

“The first is connectivity and our front to back-to-front office solution, which will be further enhanced over time,” said Eggers.

For example, when State Street processes a capital event initialised by clients, the firm provides proof of completion to the investor. The second bucket is how State Street interacts with the sources of capital, primarily the wealth manager side, but also the distributor side.

The survey said wealth management platforms are viewed as the primary channel for private markets access, while defined contribution structures remain a secondary pathway for most firms.

Sven Eggers, State Street

“We are handling far more subscriptions and redemptions for retail investors so our investments will focus on client-facing portals and direct connectivity on the transfer agency side,” added Eggers.

While retail demand is growing, the survey found that institutional investors’ demand for private markets remains resilient despite ongoing market and geopolitical uncertainty and reports of higher redemption requests. Just 7% of firms expect to reduce allocations to private markets, while half plan to increase exposure, reinforcing private markets’ role as a core component of long-term portfolio construction.

“There is not too much concern about market problems,” added Eggers. “The overall industry needs to ensure that asset managers make predictability of risk visible in products and that stress testing improves risk handling.”

Source: State Street

Real estate data

Scott Carpenter, global head of Alternatives at State Street, said in a statement that delivering private markets strategies to individual inverses at scale requires more than product innovation. He continued that it also requires the infrastructure, data and operational capabilities to provide transparency, manage liquidity and meet the expectations of a very different investor base.

Eggers agreed that broader data needs to be provided to clients. He gave the sample, of a new initiative called REDI, that has been initiated by U.S. asset owners to provide investors level with more standardized real estate data. He said standardized data has the potential to get a footprint in other areas such as private credit and private equity.

“We have launched a project in order to deliver on REDI as the fourth quarter of 2026 will be the first reporting period,” added Eggers. “REDI is quite important for State Street as a reporting service component towards our clients as we service more than $330bn on the real estate side.”

Source: REDI

Eggers highlighted that State Street services clients on both the public and private market side, and it is really important to make the firm clearly understands a client’s data requirement. He said: “Irrespective of whether we are responsible for 100%, 50% or 20% of client data, we need to ensure it fits into their data requirement and enables them to see a portfolio holistically.”

The acquisition of prime broker Hidden Road by Ripple, the fintech that offers blockchain  solutions to business, has led to increasing revenues from gaining access to Ripple’s balance sheet and synergies from access to RLUSD, Ripple’s Genius-compliant U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin and potential cost savings from using XRP Ledger, the blockchain used by Ripple.

Michael Higgins, international chief executive of Ripple Prime, told Markets Media: “Ripple has the infrastructure to enable institutional adoption of digital assets and a very large balance sheet, which made them a natural partner.”

In October 2025 Ripple completed its $1.25bn acquisition of Hidden Road, which it described as one of the fastest growing non-bank prime brokers in the world. Ripple said at the time that this was one of the largest deals in the digital assets space and that it became the first crypto company to own and operate a global, multi-asset prime broker. Following completion, the business was renamed Ripple Prime and revenues have since tripled year-over-year.

Source: Kroll

Hidden Road offered institutions a one-stop-shop for services including prime brokerage, and financing across foreign exchange, digital assets, derivatives, swaps, and fixed income. In addition, the prime broker cleared $3 trillion annually across markets with more than 300 institutions. The firm was deliberately built as a multi-asset prime brokerage and clearing firm because traditional markets can boom when there are crypto winters and vice versa, according to Higgins. Ripple also believes the these two worlds are converging over the long-term and the value of everything will tokenize over time.

Higgins helped set up Hidden Road, which was founded in 2018 by Marc Asch, formerly at hedge funds SAC Capital and Point72. He previously spent 20 years in electronic trading in multiple asset classes, but especially FX, where Higgins believes a lot of market structure can be applied to digital assets.

Hidden Road was initially looking to raise funds because the firm needed access to a larger balance sheet to meet “insatiable” client demand for prime brokerage, clearing, and financing services, according to Higgins. Both Ripple and its chief executive Brad Garlinghouse were well known to Hidden Road as an investor and client, and an organic conversation took place which led to discussions about an acquisition.

When Hidden Road was set up, the prime broker originally set out to tap buy-side capital in order to meet growing demand. In May this year Ripple closed a $200m debt facility from Neuberger Specialty Finance, the dedicated asset-based investment team within asset manager Neuberger. Ripple said the facility will support the continued growth of Ripple Prime amid rising client demand for institutional-grade prime services and margin financing solutions.

Peter Sterling, Neuberger Specialty Finance

Proceeds will be used to extend financing to clients engaging in traditional and digital markets, increasing Ripple Prime’s lending capacity and enhancing its ability to serve new and existing institutional relationships. Peter Sterling, head of Neuberger Specialty Finance, said in a statement that the facility is a testament to Ripple Prime’s “unique” position at the nexus of traditional and expanding markets.

Higgins added: “In a world that’s shifting to 24/7, we are the first mover in increasing Ripple’s balance sheet with other partners, like Neuberger.”

Collateral management

In November 2025 Ripple Prime launched digital asset spot prime brokerage capabilities for  U.S.-based institutions to execute over-the-counter (OTC) spot transactions across dozens of the most prominent digital assets. These included XRP, the native token of the open-source XRP Ledger used by Ripple, and RLUSD, Ripple’s stablecoin. Ripple Prime’s U.S.-based clients could now cross-margin OTC spot transactions and holdings with the rest of their digital asset portfolio, including OTC swaps and CME futures and options, improving capital efficiency.

Clients can post collateral and receive payments in stablecoins, In contrast in traditional markets, participants can only post U.S. dollars as collateral, and only when the banks are open, so they need a capital buffer to manage risk outside of those hours and over the weekends. Higgins said that margins can be topped up 24/7 when using stablecoins, and that efficiency is passed on to the client, especially when using RLUSD.

The firm said Ripple Prime will significantly enhance the utility and reach of RLUSD, as it is being used as collateral for a number of prime brokerage products. Certain derivatives customers have already opted to hold their balances in RLUSD, which is expected to grow substantially in the coming months, according to Ripple Prime.

“As of now, funding is needed on Friday to support what clients will do over the weekend,” added Higgins. “If the next step is GENIUS Act-compliant stablecoins, RLUSD is likely to be in the mix.”

Michael Higgins, Ripple Prime

Higgins gave the example that derivatives marketplace CME Group is likely to adopt stablecoins to help enable its recent move to 24/7 trading. Since 29 May 2026 CME’s regulated cryptocurrency futures and options have been available for trading 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He stressed that this is not just a discussion about CME, but also a broader discussion across major equities and derivatives exchanges.

“They will support multiple chains and multiple coins over time, and as a prime broker, we can lean in,” Higgins added.

Ripple Prime also benefits from accepting a zero haircut when RLUSD is used as collateral according to Higgins, because its reserves are audited and regulated. A haircut refers to a reduction applied to the value of an asset to cover the risk of not being able to sell the asset at its current market value at a later date.

Higgins said the industry is in the very early innings of clients using tokenized collateral. Ripple Prime supports many forms of tokenized collateral and expects the universe of eligible collateral to keep expanding.

“Optimizing collateral, liquidity, and settlement is really important as traditional markets shift from bank payment rails to 24/7 blockchain rails,” added Higgins.  “This is Wall Street 2.0.”

Connectivity

As a prime broker, Ripple Prime needs to provide connectivity to venues where clients choose to trade. In May this year Ripple Prime integrated with EDX Markets and EDXM International allowing clients to access EDX’s spot and perpetual futures liquidity.

Tony Acuña-Rohter, EDX

Tony Acuña-Rohter, chief executive of EDX Markets, said in a statement: “Institutions are demanding market infrastructure that combines the operational rigor of traditional finance with the innovation and efficiency of digital assets. Together, we’re helping accelerate the maturation of digital assets and setting a higher standard for market participants.”

The partnership also lays the groundwork for the future integration of RLUSD as a settlement and collateral asset on EDX for enhanced cross-collateralization and margin efficiencies across spot crypto and perpetual futures trading.

In February this year, Ripple Prime enabled support for Hyperliquid, a decentralized derivatives protocol, to enable institutional clients to access onchain derivatives liquidity while cross-margining decentralized finance (DeFi) exposures with all other asset classes supported by the prime broker. As institutional participation in DeFi accelerates, Ripple Prime aims to provide clients with scalable access to next-generation trading infrastructure while preserving the controls and capital efficiency expected of a global prime broker.

Higgins said venues like EDX and Hyperliquid are unique liquidity pools.

“We look at a combination of client demand, where the puck is moving, and regulatory standing when evaluating the venues we support,” he added. “If all these criteria are met, we can move forward.”

Ripple Prime will continue leading the way in merging DeFi with traditional prime brokerage services, offering direct support to trading, yield generation and a wider range of digital assets, said Higgins.

Using XRPL

When the acquisition was completed, Ripple said the prime broker would migrate its post-trade activity across XRPL to streamline operations and lower costs, which it said demonstrated XRPL’s potential as the “go-to blockchain for institutional decentralized finance (DeFi).” In addition, the firm sees the potential to optimize costs and liquidity in its cross-border payments solution, Ripple Payments, and provide bank-grade digital asset custody to customers.

Higgins said  Ripple Prime is in the early stages of migrating post-trade activities onto the XRP ledger, and that will meaningfully drive down costs as it scales. For example, the firm leverages the RLUSD stablecoin on XRPL.

“The XRP ledger is built with robustness, reliability, speed and low-cost transactions in mind,” he added. “While it is still the early days for institutional adoption, the network is designed to  be extremely efficient as transaction volumes continue to grow.”

There is interoperability across different chains, and all the major custodians are either integrated or are in the process of integrating XRPL, according to Higgins. He said XRPL is also being integrated with traditional financial market infrastructure.

Competition

There are other crypto-native firms providing prime brokerage and it is likely that traditional prime brokers will enter the digital asset market, once regulations allow them to do so.

“The largest market makers in US equities and foreign exchange are not banks anymore,” said Higgins. “In a world where markets move 24/7, bank prime brokers will need to upgrade their technology and shift to a follow-the-sun staffing model, and that is going to take time. We are purpose-built for this environment.”

Higgins argued that a core differentiator of Ripple Prime is its modern, unified technology stack. For example, adding support for a new venue – whether it is in digital assets, foreign exchange, listed derivatives or equities – follows the same workflow.

“This enables us to move quickly and integrate and capitalize on market innovations faster than incumbent prime brokers,” said Higgins.

The proprietary technology stack also enables seamless risk modelling across digital and traditional assets according to Higgins.

In April 2026 a Ripple Prime legal entity received a BBB investment-grade rating from Kroll. The rating applies to a legal entity that is effectively a tri-registered futures commission merchant (FCM) broker-dealer. Higgins said that operating as a rated entity backed by Ripple’s balance sheet makes it easier to raise capital as needed, and that certain institutions are only able to face regulated, rated counterparties.

Kroll said in a report that Ripple Prime’s balance sheet has grown significantly over the past twelve months, and the firm achieved profitability in 2025, supported by substantial capital injections (~$500m) from its parent. However, Kroll also warned that the rating is dependent on parent’s strong financial backing, which is driven by digital asset activity, including XRP sales, and  may be sensitive to price volatility and liquidity conditions, particularly during a prolonged digital asset downturn.

The ratings report said the fixed income repo platform, launched in March 2025, scaled to approximately $38bn of gross notional within its first year, while FCM segregated balances increased from effectively zero in 2023 to $766m at year-end 2025, which reflects increasing client adoption across both repo and exchange-traded derivatives clearing activities.

“Notwithstanding these strengths, Ripple Prime US remains earlier-stage and smaller in scale relative to established mid- and large-cap broker-dealers,” said Kroll. “While the platform’s breadth is expanding, earnings remain concentrated in financing-driven activities and brand recognition does not yet reflect the entrenched national presence of more seasoned competitors. As such, the firm’s competitive position is considered average overall, with upside contingent upon continued execution across Delta1 equity financing, equity prime brokerage, expanded repo collateral, and broader clearing connectivity.”

Higgins said Ripple Prime welcomes competition, as having more credit providers for end users forces the market to become more efficient, which ultimate benefits the end investor because they get better and faster pricing.

“Even in a crypto winter,  our business continues to thrive,” he added. “The direction is clear: institutions continue to employ more sophisticated, less speculative approaches to digital assets, and they need partners such as Ripple Prime that can support these activities in up markets and down.”

He continued that the largest asset managers are tokenizing money market funds, putting them onchain, and using them in a repo leg with a stablecoin.

“The world is inexorably moving in this direction,” said Higgins. “The current crypto winter is not a digital asset winter.”

Adam Levine joined Fireblocks in 202 and became chief executive of Fireblocks Financial Services at the start of this year as the digital asset infrastructure provider focuses on licensed services.

Levine described Fireblocks as an infrastructure layer providing the technology and connectivity to enable companies to achieve their strategy for digital assets across payments,  crypto and tokenization. He told Markets Media that on top of that technology infrastructure, firms need financial infrastructure.

Adam Levine, Fireblocks

“We are not a financial market infrastructure (FMI) but we provide core services in areas such as qualified custody and stablecoin payments where have appropriate licensing in the U.S.,” Levine added.

Bitcoin used to provide the highest volume through the Fireblocks Network, according to Levine, but that has  changed to stablecoins over the last 12 to 18 months. Levine said: “I think that is going to be a material area of growth.”

He told Markets Media that the group will continue to provide more services throughout Fireblocks Trust Company, the authorised custodian, especially collateral management, facilitating decentralise finance (DeFi) and helping clients grow their stablecoin payments. Another aim is to solve the distribution problem for digital assets.

“We are racing to market with an MVP (minimum viable product) in a few weeks to provide clients with an easier way to buy tokenized real world assets,” he added. “We are not an exchange but the SEC guidance suggests there is a way for us to leverage our security and technology.”

He stressed that Fireblocks is not pivoting away from technology, but financial services is part of a broader strategy to help meet clients where they are.

Qualified custodian

Back in May 2024 Fireblocks Trust Company, was authorized as a qualified custodian by the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS), to allow it to safeguard digital assets for institutions. Levine described the NYDFS approval as “foundational.”

He highlighted that when Fireblocks applied for the license, there was not a viable federal option for digital asset custody.

“We did not want to do forum shopping,” added Levine. “We are based in New York and felt that was the high water mark.”

Becoming a qualified custodian allowed Fireblocks to support clients in a different way, according to Levine, as registered investment advisors (RIAs) and asset managers need to work with a regulated custodian. For example, in February this year FalconX, the digital asset prime broker, said in a statement that it had integrated Fireblocks Trust Company. FalconX said regulated custody has become an increasingly important consideration for many U.S.-based institutions.

“FalconX remains committed to supporting institutional clients globally, with custody solutions tailored to regional regulatory requirements,” added the prime broker. “This integration represents a pivotal step in expanding FalconX’s institutional capabilities as the digital asset market continues to evolve.”

Levine said another area of significant growth is crypto-native clients who use Fireblocks wallets and also want to use a regulated custodian for their own security and risk tolerance. Levine added: “What is really exciting for them is that they can use literally the same user interface or API for the qualified custodian.”

Fireblocks Trust Company can hold virtually any tokenized asset including tokenized money market funds, securities, altcoins and crypto, said Levine. In the long term, he expects clients will want to use the same custodian for traditional and digital assets.

There are other crypto-native custodians, as well as traditional custodians entering the digital asset space but Levine argued that Fireblocks Trust Company can provide a more comprehensive solution. For example, the firm receives many requests from wallet clients who want a regulated custodian. In addition, clients at the custodian want to give their underlying customers an embedded wallet, which Fireblocks can provide. In addition, Fireblocks Trust Company can be a sub-custodian if traditional custodians want to provide digital asset services.

“We have a few clients today that have fully outsourced their custody solution,” added Levine. “We are speaking to some of the large traditional financial players that intend to launch their own digital asset solution and they want a sub-custodian relationship.”

Levine described collateral management as “foundational”  Collateral management is far more efficient for tokenized assets, which scam be moved more quickly 24/7.

“There are ways for Fireblocks Trust to provide collateral services that unlock huge commercial opportunities,” Levine added. “That could be for DeFi, trading relationships and even future M&A transactions.”

Source: Broadridge

DeFi grows in importance

There has been more institutional interest in tokenization since the Genius Act was passed by the U.S. administration last year to provide the first federal framework for stablecoins. Levine said that since then, the tenor of conversations with institutions has focused on non-crypto tokenized assets and lending, especially bitcoin, in order to earn yield. Institutions are increasingly coming to Fireblocks for a combination of DeFi and collateral management.

“Getting access to DeFi through a custodian, or having a collateral solution that provides lending and borrowing, are things we could not do in the same way without a quality custodian,” Levine added.

For example, in April this year Morpho, the open blockchain-based credit network, said in a statement it had integrated into Fireblocks Earn. Morpho said Fireblocks processes over $200bn in stablecoin transactions every month, but they sat idle between settlement windows and deployment cycles, largely because the infrastructure to put them to work did not exist.

Institutional users can access Morpho Vaults directly from the Fireblocks platform and deposit stablecoins into vaults curated by institutional-grade asset curators within the same custody, governance, approval, and security frameworks to turn stablecoin balances into yield-generating positions without adding operational complexity. Crypto vaults are onchain software applications that are often designed to allow users to earn yield passively through the deployment of their assets into yield-generating opportunities onchain, and operated by a curator, such as an asset manager, who sets the investment guidelines.

“There is no separate DeFi workflow to adopt. No new platform to onboard,” added Morpho.

Fireblocks’ custody clients can put idle stablecoin balances to work all long as the curated vault meets Fireblocks’ criteria. Levine said the founder of a very large asset manager told him that he thinks their whole business will be curating vaults in five years time.

“I think that we are going to see DeFi become really important for investment management globally,” added Levine.

Tokenization infrastructure grows

On 15 July 2026 DTCC, the U.S post-trade financial market infrastructure, launched the initial phase of its tokenization project when it processed live U.S. trades using tokenized securities for the first time.

Fireblocks, the digital asset infracture provider, was in the group of more than 30 firms across traditional finance and decentralized finance selected as a contributor. Fireblocks provided the wallet infrastructure behind the custody, connectivity, and policy controls for tokenized DTC-held assets.

Stephen Richardson, chief strategy officer and head of banking at Fireblocks, said in a statement that scaling tokenized securities has been talked about for years.

Stephen Richardson, Fireblocks

“On 15 July they settled inside the same infrastructure that clears most U.S. equities and Treasuries, carrying the same ownership rights and protections investors already expect, and moving tokenization beyond where any previous pilots could,” added Richardson. “That’s the piece that had to work, and now it has.”

DTCC’s full tokenized service is scheduled to launch in October 2026.

In the U.K.  Chris Woolard, the country’s wholesale digital markets champion, published his inaugural report to the government on 13 July 2026, which said tokenisation could add hundreds of billions of pounds of value to the economy by 2035.

The report highlighted actions for industry, supported by government and the UK regulators, to tokenize UK financial markets at scale which included building secondary markets, tokenizing collateral and building on the issuance of DIGIT, the U.K. digital gilt.

Over the next 12 months, members of a cross-industry taskforce of 54 firms, including Fireblocks will be working with Woolard and industry partners to deliver live end-to-end use cases, initially focusing on tokenized repo. Levine describe the initiative as “really important”.

“The private sector is going to continue to innovate but cannot do that in a vacuum,” he added.

He continued that Fireblocks has a long history of working closely with governments to ensure they understand the technology, the “art of what’s possible”, as well as listening to their priorities.

“In every market where you have the government or regulators leaning into the technology, there has been innovation, such as in Australia and Brazil,” he added.

Tokenization Pulse Survey

Tokenization is no longer a future-state concept, as financial institutions increasingly view it as a strategic priority and prepare for a future in which digital and traditional assets operate side by side, according to a survey from fintech Broadridge Financial Solutions

More than three quarters, 84% of firms, said tokenization is strategically important to their organization in the inaugural Broadridge Tokenization Pulse Survey. Nearly all, 92%, also expect digital and traditional assets to coexist for the foreseeable future. The survey covered 200 North American financial services leaders and was conducted by Phronesis Partners in May this year.

German Soto Sanchez and Mark Nichols, co-presidents of digital assets at Broadridge, said in a statement: “Across the industry, there is clear recognition that tokenization has the potential to reshape how assets are issued, traded, financed, and serviced.”

Source: Broadridge

Public market funds are among the leading areas of early adoption, with 80% of respondents expecting tokenized mutual funds and money market funds to play a meaningful role in five years.

The report said adoption is progressing at different stages across the industry with capital markets firms leading implementation efforts. Asset managers and wealth managers are continuing to build capabilities and evaluate operating models.

BlackRock’s ETF franchise, iShares, crossed $6 trillion in assets under management in the second quarter, roughly doubling in three years.

BlackRock reported financial results for the three and six months ended 30 June 2026 on 15 July 2026.

Larry Fink, chairman and chief executive said on the results call that market fundamentals are strong and well supported, with higher margins and earnings momentum catalyzed by new technology.

Martin Small, chief financial officer of BlackRock, said on the call that active and index strategies, had $178bn of net inflows in the second quarter. Core equity and bond index ETFs led the way with net inflows of $85bn and $61bn, respectively.

Momentum and active ETFs continued with $20bn of net inflows as Small said clients sought performance through a liquid, tax-efficient wrapper. Precision ETFs added $15bn as clients used iShares international and sector equity ETFs to express tactical views.

“iShares ETFs delivered a fifth consecutive quarter of double-digit organic base fee growth, powered by higher-value ETF categories such as active and precision,” added Small.

In Europe, iShares has raised $80bn so far this year, bringing assets under management to $1.5 trillion, according to Fink. In Asia Pacific locally domiciled iShares crossed $100bn in assets in  the second quarter.

Small highlighted the despite declines in crypto by about 30%, BlackRock had “very strong” inflows into the European Bitcoin ETF, and about $650m in international exposures as clients looked to diversify their portfolios using ETFs.

“Active ETFs have gathered more than $70bn in net inflows over the last year, and we are leading the industry in active flows in 2026,” said Fink. “In the last three years, we have gone from the seventh largest active ETF manager to the third largest, and we have ambitions to take our position even higher.”

ETFs boosted the group’s assets under management to a record $15.3 trillion at the end of June this year, following $868bn of net inflows over the last twelve months. Record flows of $321b in the first six months of 2026 more than doubled year-over-year, according to Fink.

Net inflows were $192bn in the second quarter, which Fink said was broad-based across the platform and driven by ETFs, private markets, active fixed income and systematic equity strategies. He said this generated 8% organic base fee growth, well in excess of BlackRock’s target.

Tokenization

Small was asked about tokenization and replied that the firm is focused on scaled, regulated access to digital assets. BlackRock has approximately $110bn in assets under management connected to digital assets, and as part of the 2030 strategic plan it aims to make this a $500m revenue business.

Over the longer term, BlackRock’s products should be accessible natively on chains where many investors already hold digital assets.

“We’re exploring ways to tokenize long-term investment products, like iShares, so investors never need to leave digital wallets to allocate efficiently across crypto, stablecoins, and exposure to long-term stocks and bonds,” added Small.

He continued that BlackRock is working with a wide group of traditional and new players on building access to high-quality long-term investment products that can grow and thrive in digital wallets and has three aims.

The first is to bridge traditional and decentralized finance (DeFI) markets with products such as BUIDL, its tokenized money market fund. Small said: “These products  invest in digitally native assets and are the largest in their categories and driving meaningful growth in the traditional capital markets.”

The second aim is to become the stablecoin reserve manager of choice in the industry. BlackRock already manages $60bn of reserves for stablecoin issuer Circle, representing about a quarter of the $300bn stablecoin market, according to Small.

“The third, and I think the most exciting for us, is tokenizing long-term investment products like treasury funds, iShares ETFs, and even private markets in the long term,” said Small.

To progress this aim, BlackRock has recently filed two registration statements with the SEC for tokenized money market funds. One filing is for a tokenized Ethereum share class in an existing fund, and the other is a more digitally native strategy with additional features such as daily dividend reinvestment. BlackRock expects the latter to be accessible through multiple chains and to operate in an ecosystem where third parties support stablecoin-enabled subscription and redemptions, so that the funding mechanism can all happen onchain in the digital wallet.

“As stablecoins and digital wallets grow, clients will need high-quality reserve and liquidity products that can operate natively in that digital ecosystem,” said Small. “These filings are bringing BlackRock’s core cash management capabilities to where digital assets clients are already operating to reinforce our broader ambition to help connect traditional capital markets and tokenized assets.”

Small highlighted that there are five billion digital wallets globally. Therefore tokenized assets are the “spear tip” into an entirely new distribution channel, accessing an entirely new class of investor, which he said is a pure organic growth opportunity for BlackRock.

“These are all potential new investors with iShares and potential new users of model portfolios, SMAs, and managed accounts in tokenized format,” Small added. “We want to build a digital wallet-native asset manager. We’re working with market participants, and regulators to do that that creates growth and resiliency and brings more investors into the markets and more organic growth at BlackRock.”

Private markets

BlackRock has set a strategy built around an integrated public and private market platform, underpinned by Aladdin, its investment technology platform. Fink highlighted that this time last year, BlackRock had just closed its acquisition of HPS and launched its 2030 strategic plan. BlackRock completed its acquisition of private credit manager HPS Investment Partners on 1 July 2025.

“Only four quarters in, our combination of GIP, HPS, and Preqin is already delivering above our expectations and accelerating our 2030 growth trajectory,” said Fink.

In March 2025 BlackRock had completed its purchase of Preqin, a private markets data provider, to serve clients’ whole portfolios across public and private markets by combining investment, technology, and data solutions in one platform. In July this year BlackRock said in a statement that it had expanded its Preqin benchmarks and indices solutions to give investors access to both reporting-grade indices and customizable, transparent peer benchmarks in one place on Aladdin. Private markets benchmarking has historically been fragmented and difficult to compare, with investors relying on disconnected tools across the investment lifecycle and often navigating multiple providers for different types of performance measurement.

Kunal Khara, global head of Aladdin product at BlackRock, said in a statement: “Expanding the breadth and quality of Preqin’s private markets data is central to bringing greater transparency and standardization to private markets, a core tenet of why we brought Preqin into BlackRock.”

In 2024 BlackRock also completed the purchase of Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), as Fink has said infrastructure is a “generational investment opportunity.”

In private markets the flywheel is in motion, according to Small, as the firm is raising and deploying capital and returning cash to clients. There was an aggregate $15bn of net inflows in the second quarter, led by deployment in private credit, fundraising and infrastructure, and partial onboarding of an outsourcing mandate and private equity solutions. BlackRock is in the market for a number of first-time and successor strategies across infrastructure and credit.

Fink argued that in infrastructure, the reach of BlackRock and GIP has resulted in a faster pace of deployment into premier investment opportunities and a faster pace of fundraising. He gave the example of the $40bn acquisition of Aligned Data Centers from Macquarie Asset Management, which is expected to close in the coming weeks and said BlackRock brought together AI Infrastructure Partnership (AIP), GIP, and MGX in the largest data center infrastructure transaction ever announced. Small said the first half of the year has been one of the busiest on record for the infrastructure platform.

“Institutional demand for private markets continues to grow, including from insurers looking to capture higher yield in their general accounts,” added Fink. “We signed several scaled high-grade investment debt infrastructure mandates in the second quarter.”

GIP and HPS are also coming together on origination, said Fink, and a pipeline of joint opportunities is building in ways that reinforces BlackRock’s conviction in the combined platform, particularly in digital infrastructure. Fink said they are working together on some very large infrastructure financings that involve both equity and debt.

“The J-curve for infrastructure investing is only just starting to accelerate and we are being asked by more technology companies to help them fund their entire investing needs,” Fink added. “Hyperscalers went from being balance sheet light companies to having major balance sheet needs in building out data centers and infrastructure, and they are looking for strategic partners that can provide them the totality of that relationship.”

Financials

Small said that two full years of above-target organic base fee growth underscores that this level of performance is sustainable.

Second quarter revenue of $7.1bn increased 31% year-over-year which the firm said reflects the positive impact of markets, organic base fee growth, fees related to the HPS transaction, higher performance fees, and higher technology services and subscription revenue. Operating income for the quarter was $2.9bn, 39% higher than a year ago.

Fink added that second quarter adjusted operating margin was 45.9%, the highest in almost five years and up 260 basis points from a year ago. He said: “We see it in our results this quarter: 8% organic base fee growth, a nearly 46% adjusted operating margin, double-digit earnings per share growth, and increasing capital return.”

Small argued that record net inflows and organic base fees in the first half of 2026 are “vivid proof points” of a firm at the center of megatrends shaping the investment landscape across public markets, private markets, and technology.

“We see strong momentum,” added Small. “Organic base fees are more than 50% higher compared to this time last year.”

Fink is very optimistic on the outlook for global markets. He said: “We see great market fundamentals with higher corporate margins and earnings momentum catalyzed by new technology. BlackRock is a direct beneficiary of this growth.”

DTCC said: “The full arc:
9:00 AM — J.P. Morgan tokenized Invesco QQQ Trust, one of the world’s most liquid ETFs. First named asset, first proof the format holds.

9:45 AM — DTCC + Microsoft confirmed a Cloud First infrastructure partnership.

10:45 AM — J.P. Morgan used tokenized assets to satisfy CCP margin requirements directly with CME Group. Not format — utility. Collateral moved to cover a real obligation.

11:40 AM — SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) tokenized. The first ETF ever created, now with a digital twin.

12:00 PM — Nasdaq MarketSite displayed the milestone in Times Square.

By 1:00 PM — Treasury repo, Treasury buy/sell, equity buy/sell, cross-chain transfers, collateral pledges, and DVP transactions across both Treasuries and equities, all executed live using DTC-custodied tokenized assets.

None of this required the CLARITY Act.

It ran on a December 2025 SEC no-action letter, inside existing securities law, using assets already sitting in DTC’s $114 trillion custody base.

October 2026 is the full launch.

Today was proof the plumbing works.

ISO Ledger”

Percival Tran said on X: “@jpmorgan just did something quietly significant. They posted tokenized assets to satisfy a margin call with CME Group, the biggest derivatives exchange on earth. Real assets, represented on-chain, accepted by a central clearing counterparty as collateral. First time it’s ever happened.

What actually happened

J.P. Morgan tokenized the assets, took real securities and created digital twins on a blockchain. Same legal rights, same instruments, just wrapped to move instantly. They posted those tokens as margin with CME Clearing. CME accepted them. Margin requirement met. Trade covered. Done. Sounds small. One margin call, one counterparty, one pilot. But the infrastructure took years. J.P. Morgan built Onyx Digital Assets and the Tokenized Collateral Network to let institutions move tokenized assets without the settlement spaghetti. CME built the ability for a CCP to accept those tokens alongside cash and physical securities. This wasn’t a lab experiment. It was a real margin call on a real exchange.

Why it matters

Collateral today runs on banker hours. Markets don’t. Equities trade near-24/7 across venues and time zones. Crypto never sleeps. But the pipes connecting institutions still punch out at 5 PM. Tokenized collateral changes that. Assets move when you need them. No settlement delay, no custodian rush. Transfer the token, the other side receives it, the blockchain records it, done. Then there’s the capital efficiency angle, and this is where the numbers get big. When collateral is tokenized, the same Treasury bond can move between margin accounts, CCPs, and venues without settlement friction. An asset idle with one clearer at 2 AM could cover a margin call with another. It goes where it’s needed, when it’s needed. For an institution, this might mean holding $60 million in collateral instead of $100 million “just in case.”

The other $40 million gets deployed somewhere productive. Scale that across a derivatives market measured in tens of trillions and you’re freeing up real money, hundreds of billions in trapped capital that can actually work.

The real signal isn’t this one pilot. It’s whether it expands: more asset types, more CCPs, more institutions. J.P. Morgan didn’t build TCN for a one-off, they’ve been on this path since at least 2020. I’m also watching how tokenized collateral intersects with stablecoins and tokenized deposits. If margin gets posted in tokenized Treasuries and settled in tokenized USD on the same rails 24/7, no bank cutoffs, no settlement windows, you’re looking at a fundamentally different market structure. Not a slightly faster version of the old one. Something materially cheaper and less fragile. The reason this pilot worked is that it didn’t try to operate outside the regulatory perimeter. The tokens have the same legal standing as the physical securities. The CCP is regulated. The custodian is regulated. It’s an upgrade from inside the system, not an attempt to replace it.”

Ondo Finance said: “The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) is the premier post-trade market infrastructure for the U.S. securities markets, processing approximately USD 4.7 quadrillion in securities transactions in 2025.

Ondo joins DTCC’s largest tokenization initiative to date alongside BlackRock, J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Nasdaq, & NYSE.

How the landmark issuance works:

1. The DTCC Tokenization Service enables the recording of DTC tokenized entitlements (also referred to as digital twins) to DTC-held securities such as CRCL and SPY, which can be delivered to DTC Participant wallets for use in connection with customers such as Ondo.
2. In our case, the DTC tokenized entitlements associated with CRCL and SPY serve as digital twins of the securities underlying existing CRCLon and SPYon Ondo Stocks.
3. DTC-held securities can be converted between traditional and tokenized forms, enabling greater flexibility, access to new liquidity opportunities, and additional digital asset use cases.
4. That additional functionality can enhance the utility of assets such as CRCLon and SPYon (Ondo Stocks) held across Ondo’s global partner network of exchanges, wallets, & DeFi platforms.

Ondo Finance CEO Ian De Bode on what comes next:

“As tokenized securities markets continue to evolve, Ondo expects to play a leading role in bringing these assets onchain for investors.”

Andrew McCormick, head of institutional and market development at Chainlink, said:

Every few years, capital markets gets a headline everyone remembers.

Zero-commission trading.
GameStop phenomenon.
Bitcoin ETFs approved.

I believe today's announcement from @The_DTCC will become one of those defining moments.

Excited that @chainlink is helping write the next… https://t.co/fe07c3huxt

— Andrew McCormick (@AndrewMcMarkets) July 15, 2026

DTCC Turns Tokenization into Reality: U.S. Trades Successfully Processed Using DTC-Tokenized Assets

Firm validates that tokenization service can bridge TradFi and digital markets by tokenizing DTC-held securities for multiple on-chain trades

Event marks major milestone ahead of DTCC Tokenization Service launch in October 2026 and progresses the evolution of the financial digital ecosystem

The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), the premier post-trade market infrastructure for the global financial services industry, announced that it successfully converted assets held at The Depository Trust Company (DTC) into tokens that were then used in real production trades, a notable milestone that marks the largest tokenization production initiative in breadth of use cases, asset classes and number of participants.

The tokenized trades were processed on July 15 and marked a significant milestone that sets the stage for the DTCC Tokenization Service to launch in October 2026. More than 30 firms representing a cross-section of traditional financial institutions (TradFi) and digital market participants took part in the initiative, underscoring broad industry engagement, the capabilities of the DTCC Tokenization Service, DTCC’s critical role as a financial market infrastructure and the importance of interoperability. The digital conversions occurred on HyperLedger Besu (DTCC’s private network) and Canton (a public network). This is part of DTCC’s multi-chain strategy to ensure resiliency, scalability and choice.

The DTCC Tokenization Service enables the issuance of tokenized representations (also referred to as digital twins) of real-world assets that can be delivered to DTC Participant wallets of choice. The DTC-held securities can be converted between traditional and tokenized forms, allowing DTC Participants to access new liquidity pools and execute digital asset strategies with greater flexibility.

“DTCC demonstrated that we can apply the same institutional rigor to tokenization as we do for traditional assets while continuing to safeguard the integrity and resiliency of the global financial markets,” said Frank La Salla, President and CEO of DTCC. “The DTCC Tokenization Service will institutionalize tokenized markets on day one and will be a critical enabler of the digital ecosystem of the future, while reinforcing trust, safety and scale in a digital world.”

The event featured several transactions made across various asset classes in a DTC production environment, including collateral pledge, security lending, U.S. Treasury/repo delivery-versus-payment (DVP) trade, equity DVP trade, equity delivery-versus-delivery (DVD) trade, equity token transfer and central counterparty (CCP) margin workflows.

The transactions using DTC-tokenized securities – conducted over the course of several hours – were designed and selected to reflect real-world use cases and validated the ability of DTCC’s Tokenization Service to provide the same resiliency, integrity, protections and operational rigor as traditional infrastructure. 

Multiple market participant firms, blockchain networks, wallets, exchanges, issuers and applications participated, including Alpaca, BetaNXT, BitGo Bank & Trust, N.A., BlackRock, Blockdaemon, BNP Paribas Securities Corporation, Broadridge, Chainlink, Circle, Citadel Securities, CME Group, Digital Asset Holdings (creators of Canton Network), DriveWealth, DRW, Fireblocks, Flow Traders, FTSE Russell, Goldman Sachs, HIFI, Invesco, J.P. Morgan, Kaleido, Linux Foundation Decentralized Trust (LF Decentralized Trust), Marex, Microsoft, Nasdaq, New York Stock Exchange, Ondo Finance, Prometheum Capital, S&P Dow Jones Indices, Societe Generale, State Street Investment Management, Talos, Temple Digital Group, Tradeweb, Vanguard, Velocity Capital LLC and Virtu Financial, Inc.

“DTCC successfully showcased how tokenization can enable real-time collateral mobility, enhance liquidity and capital efficiency, reduce counterparty risk and support interoperability between traditional and digital ecosystems,” said Brian Steele, President of Clearing & Securities Services at DTCC. “Market participants will soon have the best of both worlds because DTC-tokenized assets maintain the same investor protections, entitlements and ownership rights as traditional securities, all while enabling greater efficiency, programmability and security.”

“Innovation requires collaboration. Because of DTCC’s role in global financial markets, we convened key industry participants to help us design the DTCC Tokenization Service,” said Nadine Chakar, Managing Director, Global Head of DTCC Digital Assets. “DTCC demonstrated that the safest, most direct path to decentralization runs through trusted financial market infrastructures and that legacy and Web3 ecosystems can coexist without disruption.”

This milestone comes seven months after DTC received a No-Action Letter from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), authorizing DTC to operate a tokenization service for real-world assets it custodies. The DTCC Tokenization Service was created in collaboration with the DTCC Industry Working Group, which has grown in recent months to more than 100 members and partners.

Source: DTCC

Phong Le, chief executive of Strategy, said on X that Strategy is introducing the bitcoin bank adoption index. He said adoption of Bitcoin and the related digital asset ecosystem across major banks and financial institutions is accelerating, but still early at 32%.

Introducing the Bitcoin Bank Adoption Index. Adoption of Bitcoin and the related digital asset ecosystem across major banks and financial institutions is accelerating, but still early at 32%.

Methodology and updates to follow. Institutions with questions, corrections, or… pic.twitter.com/BEajJPIE63

— Phong Le (@phongle) July 13, 2026

Fidelity, the U.S asset manager, tops the index with an index score of 71%. For example, in May this year Fidelity International launched its first tokenized fund, FILQ.

Swiss-based digital asset banking group Sygnum said at the time that the launch arrived as treasury-focused tokenized money market funds near $15bn assets under management, attracting participation from the world’s largest asset managers, digital asset exchanges, stablecoin issuers, and DeFi protocols.

“FILQ demonstrates how tokenization is evolving from experimentation into scalable financial market infrastructure,” added Sygnum. “By partnering with Fidelity International and infrastructure providers including Chainlink, Apex Group, and JPMorgan, this launch shows how connected ecosystems can support regulated investment products in a more digital and always-accessible market environment.”

Abigail Johnson, Fidelity

Abigail Johnson, chairman and chief executive of Fidelity, said in her annual letter in March this year that Fidelity was an early adopter of crypto. The asset manager started bitcoin mining in 2014 and launched its first commercial offering in 2017.

“This year, we expanded our digital assets offerings and capabilities with the launch of Fidelity Crypto for individual retirement accounts (IRAs), a Solana coin offering, Fidelity Solana fund, and an onchain share class for Fidelity Treasury digital fund,” she added. “Fidelity Digital Assets also enhanced the retail investor experience by rolling out deposit and withdrawal transfers for all eligible Fidelity crypto accounts.”

Tokenization isn’t a pilot anymore.

It represents a structural shift in how assets are issued, traded, and settled—and it’s already being adopted at an institutional level.

From Treasuries to equities, the rails are being rebuilt in real time.

Read the full report:… pic.twitter.com/cFCNfkI7h9

— Fidelity Digital Assets (@DigitalAssets) June 18, 2026

BNY, the U.S bank and custodian, is in second place in the index with 46% and Goldman Sachs is third at 45%.

Marc Baumann, founder of 51, which provides commentary on digital assets, said on X: “this week we get an index saying bank adoption is already a third of the way there. the custody and settlement rails are going in right now. the allocation follows the rails, not the other way around.”

32% is the number to watch, not the price.

a year ago major-bank bitcoin adoption was a rounding error. last week Swift put 17 of the world's largest banks on a shared blockchain ledger. this week we get an index saying bank adoption is already a third of the way there.

the… https://t.co/sOQ8d01cUD

— Marc Baumann (@marcb_xyz) July 14, 2026

Spendnode, which tracks card issuers, highlighted that Strategy is not neutral as a bitcoin treasury company: “A company with that position publishing its own adoption index is closer to a marketing instrument than an independent benchmark.”

BANK BITCOIN ADOPTION SCORED AT 32%
Strategy just published a Bitcoin Banking Adoption Index. It puts overall bank exposure at 32%, with Fidelity in front at 71%.
One number, one issuer, and a metric nobody else defines yet. We break down what it measures and what it quietly…

— SpendNode (@spendnode) July 14, 2026

“That does not make the numbers wrong. It means the methodology matters more than usual, and the methodology has not been independently audited,” added Spendnode. “Until that detail is public, 32% is a claim, not a settled fact. Treat it as a directional signal from an interested party.”

Michael Drummey, Head of US Risk Trading for Mizuho Americas, won Excellence in Trading at 2026 Global Markets Choice Awards. 

What were the key drivers behind Mizuho’s trading desk success over the past year?

In trading, you need volatility, headlines, and things that move markets. But without the right team in place to capitalize on that volatility, you won’t be successful. At Mizuho, we have put together a very senior, high-quality team in trading and sales trading – experienced professionals who have seen all kinds of markets and processed all types of risk. That experience and market knowledge enabled us to identify and capitalize on opportunities against a particularly active, volatile backdrop this past year.

What market developments have had the biggest impact on trading desks over the past year?

The increasing adoption of AI – both as a market driver and as a tool for improving execution. While there are still more questions than answers about how the technology will evolve, AI has already contributed meaningfully to volumes and volatility across institutional and retail markets. At the same time, trading desks are focused on how AI can improve workflows, support execution, strengthen client interaction, and ultimately help clients make money—so its impact is being felt on both sides of the equation.

How do you balance technology, automation, and human judgment in today’s trading environment?

Technology will continue to improve market access and execution, from low-touch trading to the buy side’s ability to execute its own order flow, and now to AI-driven tools. But even as AI helps price blocks, suggest execution strategies, and identify market movers, experienced traders are still needed to interpret the information, assess what matters, and make the final call. The right balance is using technology and automation to enhance speed and efficiency while relying on human judgment to read the nuanced signals in the market.

What are clients looking for most from their trading partners, particularly in the current market?

Clients have more tools than ever to execute flow themselves, so what they value most from trading partners is trust, context, market knowledge, and the ability to distill what matters. In today’s market, there is so much information floating around, and clients rely on us to help them understand what is moving stocks, identify what is important versus what is noise, and provide content and insight that helps them service their portfolio managers and execute more thoughtfully. That combination of relationships, service, and judgment is hard to replicate with technology alone.

Beyond AI, what forces do you see changing the business over the next few years?

One of the biggest forces changing the business is the evolution of market structure, particularly the growing influence of retail and passive flows. Retail options usage, one-day-to-expiration options, levered ETFs, and steady buying through 401(k)s, IRAs, and other passive vehicles have become major drivers of daily market activity. That persistent buy demand can be valuation-agnostic and fundamental-agnostic, which means even thoughtful stock or sector analysis can be wrong if it misses the underlying supply-and-demand dynamics.

I’ve been around long enough to know the market moves in cycles, so it will be interesting to see how these dynamics play out on a longer time horizon.

A number of pre-IPO perpetual futures were launched on SK Hynix, the South Korean computer chip manufacturer, which raised  $26.5bn on Nasdaq in the largest listing by a foreign company in the U.S.

The company said in a filing on 9 July 2026 that it had sold 177.9 million American depositary receipts (ADRs) for $149 each. A depository bank that holds shares in an overseas company can issue ADRs which represent this holding. Once ADRs are listed on a U.S. exchange they can be traded in the same way as a domestic U.S. stock. In the case  of SK Hynix, each ADR represents once tenth of a share traded in South Korea.

JJ Kinahan, Cboe

JJ Kinahan, head of retail expansion and alternative investment products at Cboe Global Markets, said in a blog this is the largest ever ADR offering, overtaking the $21.8bn in 2014 from Alibaba, the Chinese technology conglomerate that specializes in e-commerce, cloud computing, digital media, and retail.

Kinahan said: “For U.S. investors, this is the first new route into the stock, and given that it was seven times oversubscribed, it looks like it’s a magnet.”

SK Hynix’s Securities and Exchange Commission’s filing said it commands 56% of the high-bandwidth memory, according to Kinahan, as it is a huge supplier for Nvidia. Kinahan said: “It will be interesting to watch the markets throughout the day for a check on whether investors rotate out of a handful of tech shares to fund a piece of this new investment.”

Perpetual futures 

TradeXYZ, a perpetual futures exchange on the Hyperliquid blockchain, inaugurated the pre-IPO perpetual contract market on 1 May 2026 when it listed a contract for Cerebras Systems, the artificial intelligence chip manufacturer. Perpetual futures are contracts without an expiration date that track the spot rate of the underlying asset through a funding rate.

Pre-IPO perpetual futures allow traders to take a view on the company’s share price once it goes public. They provide a synthetic exposure as they are not shares, IPO allocations, tokenized equity, or claims on the issuer, so holders do not receive ownership, dividends, voting rights, or primary-market allocation rights.

On 18 May TradeXYZ subsequently launched a perpetual futures contract ahead of the IPO of SpaceX, Elon Musk’s rocket and artificial intelligence company. Other crypto companies, including Coinbase, the U.S.-listed crypto exchange, also launched pre-IPO perpetual futures on SpaceX.

Before listing, there is no public equity price so the pre-IPO perpetual market operates with an internal pricing mechanism. XYZ said in a blog that it launched each pre-IPO perpetual market with a discretionary reference price. The market may also display an initial reference share count and an implied initial reference market cap.

0xResearch, a Blockworks newsletter, reviewed the Cerebras Systems (CBRS) pre-IPO perpetual and found that the future provided price discovery ahead of the listing on 14 May 2026.

“Across the final hour before the Nasdaq print, TradeXYZ’s CBRS market traded at a VWAP only 1.2% above the eventual opening price,” said OxResearch. “In the final minute before the cross, CBRS was trading around $360 on TradeXYZ, just 2.8% above Nasdaq’s first print.”

a new form of price discovery on xyz today with SKHY — the adr premium for us shares of foreign stocks

similar to SPCX and CBRS given 7x oversubscription but [slightly] more grounded here because of the local underlying

opened on xyz at ~3%, now 10% with korea local open… https://t.co/bGeguDWGKP pic.twitter.com/rUSv8JBWBy

— walter (@ringwraith10) July 10, 2026

$SKHY opened on the Nasdaq @ $170
Bloomberg indications were it would open ~$174 (+2.4% miss)@tradexyz 's SKHY pre IPO perp, priced it at:
3 hours out: $164 (-3.4% miss)
1 hour out: $169.80 (within 0.1%)
1 minute out: $169.92 (within 0.05%)

Hyperliquid

— kidponga (@kidponga) July 10, 2026

TradeXYZ said on X that its existing perpetual futures for the SK Hynix primary listing in Seoul remain unchanged.

“The two markets are related but distinct: 10 ADRs represent 1 common share, and the ADR may trade at a premium or discount to the Seoul line,” added TradeXYZ. “As always, participants are advised to understand a market’s underlying before trading.”

the coolest aspect about new @tradexyz listings is how it democratizes new forms of trading across the board
– in march, we had brent-wti rolls <> massive funding during calendar rolls
– now in july xyz:SKHY is the first time people can take high leveraged views on ADR premia –… https://t.co/tXtEglw5a8 pic.twitter.com/LB80BsL9Ie

— walter (@ringwraith10) July 10, 2026

walter said on X: “now in july xyz:SKHY is the first time people can take high leveraged views on ADR premia — particularly as the skhy adr opened up +20% relative to the local perp today the ADR perp traded $300m while the local perp traded $900m — but more interestingly, you see a growing positioning of people trading adr [perp] prem itself [with a heavier lean towards fading the premium]”

Brett Harrison, Architect

Once the company is listed, the pre-IPO contracts convert into standard perpetual futures. Brett Harrison, founder and chief executive of Architect, the multinational derivatives exchange group that includes the AX Exchange for regulated international perpetual futures, argued on X that perpetual futures have some advantages over ADRs.

These advantages include not requiring a depository bank and its associated fees, the ability to short, and better price discovery.

“The SKHY ADR on Nasdaq and its underlying stock 000660 on KRX have no trading hours in common,” he added. “There is never an opportunity for true arbitrage where the two markets can be brought in line.”

In contrast, Harrison said perpetuals can easily trade 24/7 and provide ample time for the derivative and the underlying stock prices to converge.

SK Hynix listed today as an American Depositary Receipt (ADR) on Nasdaq. ADRs are the primary instrument for US investors to gain exposure to foreign stocks. and they’re what I started my career trading at Jane Street. The main advantages of perpetual futures over ADRs:

•… pic.twitter.com/lGL0p2XLTR

— Brett Harrison (@BrettHarrison) July 10, 2026

Harrison said: “SK Hynix ringing the Nasdaq bell is a genuine milestone for the ADR model as the largest ADR offering by a foreign company in history. Regulated U.S. perpetuals will augment our ADR markets and provide investors wider exposure to strategic global companies in AI and other advanced industries.”

In addition to perpetual futures being launched, Reuters reported that U.S. exchanges, including Cboe Global Markets and Nasdaq, are expected to list options on SK Hynix’s ADRs two business days after the trading debut,