Three of the largest U.S. retail brokerages — Interactive Brokers, Charles Schwab, and Morgan Stanley's E\*Trade — are launching or preparing to launch direct cryptocurrency trading for a combined client base exceeding 50 million accounts and more than $20 trillion in supervised assets. Interacti...
"Our clients want the flexibility to diversify into crypto-assets while maintaining the tools, pricing, and trust they rely on Interactive Brokers for. By offering crypto alongside traditional assets on a single platform, clients can manage risk, liquidity, and capital more efficiently across their entire portfolio." — Milan Galik, CEO, Interactive Brokers
Three of the largest U.S. retail brokerages — Interactive Brokers, Charles Schwab, and Morgan Stanley's E*Trade — are launching or preparing to launch direct cryptocurrency trading for a combined client base exceeding 50 million accounts and more than $20 trillion in supervised assets. Interactive Brokers went live on March 31, 2026, offering 11 tokens to European Economic Area clients. Schwab targets mid-April 2026 for its 37 million U.S. clients. E*Trade plans to go live in the first half of 2026.
The structural effect is a two-way convergence: traditional brokerages are adding crypto, while crypto-native platforms — Coinbase and Robinhood — are adding equities and ETFs. The result is a collapsing boundary between asset classes, with a single infrastructure provider, ZeroHash, now valued at $1.5 billion, sitting at the center of the plumbing for multiple launches. For crypto-native exchanges, the fee compression this implies is material: Interactive Brokers charges 0.12%–0.18% per trade, undercutting Coinbase's retail take rate by a wide margin.
Interactive Brokers activated cryptocurrency trading for eligible individual investors in the European Economic Area on March 31, 2026. The platform supports 11 tokens: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, XRP, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, Chainlink, Cardano, Dogecoin, Avalanche, and Sui.
Clients can now trade crypto alongside stocks, options, futures, currencies, bonds, and mutual funds from a single account. Commissions range from 0.12% to 0.18% of trade value, with no hidden fees. Trading runs 24/7 with limit order support.
Interactive Brokers reports approximately $814 billion in client assets under management and over 4.5 million client accounts as of January 2026, representing 37% year-over-year growth in client equity. The firm added more than 1 million new accounts during 2025.
The crypto service is operated through Interactive Brokers Ireland Limited, a regulated crypto-asset service provider. Custody and transaction processing are handled by ZeroHash, which holds a MiCA authorization from the Dutch Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM), enabling passporting across all EU and EEA markets.
The launch targets an addressable population of approximately 450 million people in the EEA, according to company disclosures.
Charles Schwab, which oversees more than $7 trillion in client assets across roughly 37 million accounts, plans to launch direct spot cryptocurrency trading by mid-April 2026. CEO Rick Wurster confirmed the timeline, stating: "Our expectation is that with the changing regulatory environment, we are hopeful and likely to be able to launch direct spot crypto."
The rollout begins with Bitcoin and Ethereum only, reflecting what the firm describes as a "compliance-first" build. Trading will initially be available on the Thinkorswim platform before expanding to Schwab.com and the firm's mobile app. The firm is conducting internal staff testing followed by a small client pilot before broader access.
The demand signal is measurable. Schwab reports a 400% increase in traffic to its cryptocurrency education content, with 70% of those visitors not yet Schwab clients. The firm previously offered only indirect crypto exposure through Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs. A direct Schwab survey of retail investors found that roughly 90% of respondents expressed increased interest in crypto assets over the prior 12 months.
Unlike Interactive Brokers, Schwab is building internal books and records for crypto transactions rather than relying entirely on third-party providers, though details of the custody arrangement remain undisclosed.
Morgan Stanley plans to offer cryptocurrency trading to E*Trade clients in the first half of 2026. The initial offering will include Bitcoin, Ether, and Solana, with custody, liquidity, and settlement handled through ZeroHash.
Morgan Stanley invested in ZeroHash's $104 million Series D-2 round in September 2025, alongside Interactive Brokers, SoFi, Apollo-managed funds, and Jump Crypto. E*Trade's crypto launch would provide clients with direct ownership of digital assets, cutting out third-party management fees associated with ETF wrappers.
Analysts at CryptoNews estimate the move could unlock up to $1.3 trillion in potential trading volume, given E*Trade's existing client base and Morgan Stanley's wealth management footprint, which spans approximately $6.5 trillion in client assets.
The bank has not disclosed commission rates for crypto trading on E*Trade. However, the use of ZeroHash infrastructure — the same provider used by Interactive Brokers — suggests a similarly competitive fee structure.
A single infrastructure provider underpins multiple launches. ZeroHash, founded in 2017, provides the back-end infrastructure — custody, settlement, and compliance — that enables traditional financial institutions to embed crypto trading into their existing platforms.
The firm raised $104 million in a Series D-2 round in September 2025 at a $1 billion valuation. By January 2026, it was in talks to raise an additional $250 million at a $1.5 billion valuation, according to CoinDesk. Investors include Interactive Brokers, Morgan Stanley, SoFi, Mastercard, and Jump Crypto.
ZeroHash secured MiCA authorization from the Dutch AFM, enabling operations across the European Economic Area. The firm expanded its Amsterdam headquarters in March 2026 to serve as its central European base.
Current clients include Interactive Brokers, MoneyLion, Current, Curve, Step, Stripe, Wirex, MoonPay, Banxa, DraftKings, and Transak. Interactive Brokers also plans to roll out a stablecoin product through its ZeroHash partnership.
ZeroHash's positioning as a shared utility layer across competing brokerages creates a concentration risk worth monitoring. If multiple $10-trillion-plus asset managers route through a single settlement provider, that provider becomes systemically relevant infrastructure — a dynamic regulators have not yet addressed.
The convergence runs both ways. In February 2026, Coinbase introduced stock and ETF trading for all U.S. users. Trading runs 24 hours a day, five days a week, with zero commission. Customers can fund trades with U.S. dollars or USDC and buy fractional shares starting at $1.
CEO Brian Armstrong outlined plans to build an "everything exchange" in 2026, combining crypto, equities, prediction markets, and commodities. The move puts Coinbase in direct competition with Robinhood, Schwab, and Fidelity on equities — the same firms now entering Coinbase's core crypto market.
Robinhood, which generated $221 million in crypto trading revenue in Q4 2025 (down 38% year-over-year), has expanded in the opposite direction — deepening its crypto product suite while adding prediction markets and options capabilities. Robinhood's crypto trading volume on its own app fell 52% year-over-year to $34 billion in Q4 2025, though total volume including Bitstamp was $82.4 billion.
Coinbase stock traded at approximately $167 as of late March 2026, down 60% from its 52-week high of $420 in July 2025. The stock's decline coincides with the entry of traditional brokerages into direct crypto trading, though broader crypto market weakness is also a factor.
Interactive Brokers charges 0.12%–0.18% per crypto trade. Coinbase's retail take rate has historically ranged from 1.5% to over 2.0% on smaller transactions. Robinhood offers zero-commission crypto trading but monetizes through payment for order flow.
The entry of traditional brokerages creates downward pressure on crypto trading fees across the industry. For a retail investor buying $10,000 in Bitcoin, the cost difference between Interactive Brokers (approximately $12–$18) and Coinbase's standard retail rate (approximately $150–$200) is material.
This fee dynamic has implications for the economic model of crypto-native exchanges. Coinbase generated $6.6 billion in total revenue in 2025, with transaction fees comprising a significant portion. As Schwab's 37 million clients and E*Trade's user base gain access to low-cost crypto trading, the competitive pressure on Coinbase's retail margins intensifies.
However, pure-play crypto exchanges retain structural advantages: broader token selection, DeFi integrations, staking services, and on-chain capabilities that traditional brokerages do not yet offer. Coinbase's Base L2, USDC stablecoin ecosystem, and institutional custody business represent revenue streams that brokerage competitors cannot easily replicate.
The structural barrier between traditional brokerage and cryptocurrency trading is dissolving in Q2 2026. The convergence is not speculative — it is calendared. Interactive Brokers is live. Schwab has a mid-April date. E*Trade plans for H1 2026.
The economic implications are asymmetric. For traditional brokerages, crypto is a client acquisition and retention tool, adding marginal revenue to an existing infrastructure. For crypto-native exchanges, the entry of firms with $20+ trillion in supervised assets and sub-0.2% commission rates represents a direct threat to retail transaction revenue — historically their highest-margin business.
The competitive question is no longer whether traditional finance will offer crypto. It is whether crypto-native platforms can build enough differentiated value — through DeFi access, token breadth, staking yield, and on-chain infrastructure — to justify higher fees. The market will answer that question by the end of 2026.