--- title: "Robinhood brings millions of ordinary users into centralized finance" type: "News" locale: "en" url: "https://longbridge.com/en/news/293769860.md" description: "Robinhood launched a new blockchain to onboard its 27.6 million users into on-chain finance, aiming to introduce tokenized assets and derivatives. However, data reveals that activity is dominated by meme coin speculation rather than the intended real-world asset (RWA) focus. Despite briefly surpassing Ethereum in DEX volume with $878 million, actual deployed TVL remains low at $211 million, highlighting the platform's early-stage challenges in converting retail interest into sustainable financial usage." datetime: "2026-07-24T14:18:31.000Z" locales: - [zh-CN](https://longbridge.com/zh-CN/news/293769860.md) - [en](https://longbridge.com/en/news/293769860.md) - [zh-HK](https://longbridge.com/zh-HK/news/293769860.md) --- # Robinhood brings millions of ordinary users into centralized finance Robinhood (HOOD) stated that its new chain is not intended to compete with native crypto exchanges like Hyperliquid, but rather to allow its 27.6 million users with funds to enter on-chain finance for the first time; however, current data suggests that reality is far more complex than this story. While the chain achieved a 24-hour DEX trading volume of $878 million on July 12th, briefly surpassing Base and Ethereum, on-chain activity is primarily driven by Meme coin speculation, rather than its original focus on tokenized stocks and ETFs. Of the $734 million in assets bridged into the chain, only $211 million was actually deployed in lending or yield products. Meanwhile, the market capitalization of tokenized real-world assets (RWA) on this chain is only $12.66 million, far below the peak of $156 million reached by the cat-themed meme coin CASHCAT. Robinhood Chain briefly surged to second place in trading volume on decentralized exchanges (DEXs) last weekend, leading many to compare it to some of the largest networks in the crypto market. However, Robinhood believes this comparison misses the point. This popular trading app believes its real opportunity lies not in taking trading volume from existing native crypto trading platforms, but in leveraging Robinhood's more than 27.6 million "users with funds accounts" to bring a new wave of investors into the tokenized asset and on-chain derivatives market. Robinhood Crypto Product Manager Seong Seog Lee told CoinDesk, “Our opportunity isn’t about taking trading volume away from existing crypto traders. Most people have never been exposed to perpetual contracts, not necessarily because they don’t want that kind of exposure, but because the gateway to these products has never existed. We’re changing that.” He added, “Now, users in over 120 countries and regions can trade gold, silver, forex, and crypto perpetual contracts directly within the Robinhood Wallet via Lighter.” Robinhood’s bet seems to be that its distribution capabilities, consumer relationships, and wallet integration capabilities can bring users who might not otherwise use on-chain finance directly into the blockchain market, without them having to actively seek out more specialized crypto platforms. However, the current problem is that activity on this network remains highly focused on speculative Memecoin trading, and its initial narrative on real-world asset transactions remains small in scale. According to DefiLlama data, Robinhood Chain's 24-hour DEX trading volume on July 12th was approximately $878 million, briefly surpassing Coinbase's Base and Ethereum. This ranking sparked heated discussions within the crypto community. However, the absolute scale remains quite limited. On July 13th, the perpetual contract trading volume on this chain was only $5.9 million; in contrast, Hyperliquid, the decentralized exchange that has become the benchmark for on-chain derivatives, saw a trading volume of $8.9 billion that day. Meanwhile, Robinhood Chain's bridged total value locked (TVL) reached $734 million, far exceeding its actual TVL of $211 million. This disparity means that many assets are simply sitting in wallets and haven't actually been deployed to the chain's lending pools and yield products. A similar situation previously occurred on another network, Blast. Blast attracted over $2 billion in bridged assets through its points incentive program, with a large influx of yield hunters "mining points" in anticipation of future airdrops. As the incentive program ended, its TVL (total value of funds) collapsed significantly. However, Robinhood's situation may not be entirely the same, as it doesn't have this type of yield incentive. Even so, this contrast highlights that this mass-market trading platform's blockchain business is still in its very early stages. While the network briefly experienced a spot trading boom, it has not yet developed the deeper trading activity and capital deployments common on mature blockchains. "Perfect for Memes" The initial core use case for this chain was tokenized real-world assets (RWA), including the narrative surrounding equity-based products raised through Robinhood and private companies like OpenAI and SpaceX. However, at least so far, this segment hasn't achieved significant scale. The active market capitalization of tokenized RWA is only $12.66 million, negligible compared to the recent trading frenzy. Instead, a larger portion of the activity comes from Meme coin traders who have flocked to a new token called CASHCAT—named after Robinhood's early mascot. This token surged over 2100% in its first week, with its market capitalization reaching $156 million at one point—12 times the total market capitalization of all tokenized real-world assets on the entire chain. However, it should be noted that Meme coins are inherently highly volatile and sentiment-driven asset classes, often lacking a foundation for sustainable growth. This unsustainability was already evident on Wednesday: Noxa, the token issuance platform that incubated CashCat, announced it was ceasing operations and would transfer all revenue to creators. Noxa's closure doesn't determine the fate of Robinhood Chain, but it highlights a point: the activity built around Meme coin issuance can disappear very quickly. Ironically, Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev told CNBC on July 2nd that Meme Coin was a dead end—this type of asset had no utility or practical use. However, just six days later, he posted on X that Robinhood Chain was "also very suitable for launching Meme Coins," clearly a statement made after seeing the popularity of CASHCAT. When asked about this seemingly contradictory statement, Lee stated that while Meme Coin is not a core strategic focus for the team, the chain is indeed built with the goal of "opening up the financial system." Lee said, "I don't see any contradiction. If you're creating an open financial system, then it should certainly support Memecoin. The most exciting thing about Robinhood Chain is that we can't fully predict everything that will happen in the future." Robinhood Chain officially launched to the public earlier this month, after months of testing since February. Built on Arbitrum, this Ethereum Layer 2 network is designed primarily to support tokenized real-world assets, especially stocks and ETFs, rather than Memecoin trading. This launch reflects Robinhood's broader strategy: bringing traditional financial assets onto the blockchain through its own, retail-facing blockchain infrastructure. The current situation Robinhood Chain is experiencing is quite similar to the path most new chains take upon launch. The market immediately compares it to some of the most talked-about networks of the past, such as Blast—whose TVL plummeted from $2.2 billion to $29 million in two years. A more relevant point of comparison for Robinhood Chain is Coinbase's Base, launched in 2023. Base initially also had an institutional narrative, but later, driven by Memecoin, it gradually achieved real-world scale. The difference is that Base ultimately grew into a consumer-grade blockchain with genuine developer activity and a wider user base. The key question for the next few months is whether this current wave of speculation will translate into long-term use, or whether the hype will quickly fade once traders move on to the next hot concept. Lee stated, "We expect users to discover the various possibilities that Robinhood Chain can offer, including bringing real-world assets onto the blockchain, 24/7 stock token trading, on-chain lending, and more." ### Related Stocks - [HOOD.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOOD.US.md) - [ETHE.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/ETHE.US.md) - [ETHV.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/ETHV.US.md) - [XEY.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/XEY.US.md) - [QETH.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/QETH.US.md) - [CETH.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/CETH.US.md) - [FETH.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/FETH.US.md) - [HOOG.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOOG.US.md) - [HOOX.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOOX.US.md) - [EZET.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/EZET.US.md) - [ROBN.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/ROBN.US.md) - [ETHW.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/ETHW.US.md) - [ETHA.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/ETHA.US.md) - [HODU.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HODU.US.md) - [HOOI.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOOI.US.md) - [HOOW.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOOW.US.md) - [HOOY.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOOY.US.md) - [HOOZ.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOOZ.US.md) - [HOYY.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/HOYY.US.md) - [ETHHKD.VAHK](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/ETHHKD.VAHK.md) - [ETHUSD.VAHK](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/ETHUSD.VAHK.md) - [COIN.US](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/COIN.US.md) - [OpenAI.NA](https://longbridge.com/en/quote/OpenAI.NA.md) ## Related News & Research - [HOOD Q2 Earnings Countdown: What Awaits Vlad Tenev-Led Fintech Firm After Robinhood Chain's Successful Launch](https://longbridge.com/en/news/294037658.md) - [Robinhood Q2 Preview: Prediction Markets, Meme Coins & Trump Accounts Could Power Earnings](https://longbridge.com/en/news/294108411.md) - [Robinhood's quarterly revenue beats estimates on the back of strong prediction market volumes](https://longbridge.com/en/news/294254969.md) - [Robinhood’s AI Trading Agents Have Over 100,000 Users— but CEO Vlad Tenev Admits the Models Sometimes ‘Fights You’ When Asked to Trade](https://longbridge.com/en/news/294317118.md) - [Major Move: Key Robinhood Shareholder Reshapes Its Stake in Ventures Fund I](https://longbridge.com/en/news/294138512.md)