Morgan Stanley invests in Zerohash with a $104 million funding round, led by Interactive Brokers and supported by SoFi, Apollo, and Jump Crypto, turning the startup into a unicorn valued at $1 billion.
Zerohash‘s partnership with Morgan Stanley will soon offer its millions of E-Trade clients the ability to buy and sell Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana, targeting a more traditional investor audience.
This move, facilitated by regulatory relaxation under the Trump administration, signals a turning point for Wall Street, legitimizing the convergence of traditional finance and digital assets.
Strategic Funding for Zerohash
The Wall Street giant delves deeper into the crypto world than ever before. Morgan Stanley has just invested in the $104 million Series D-2 funding round of Zerohash, a startup specializing in blockchain infrastructure. This round, led by Interactive Brokers, brought together heavyweights like SoFi, funds managed by Apollo, and Jump Crypto. With this operation, Zerohash reaches unicorn status with a billion-dollar valuation.
Zerohash is not a mainstream exchange. The company develops key technological elements to connect banks and fintech companies to cryptos: APIs for processing fiats, stablecoins, and digital assets. It is this expertise that Morgan Stanley will leverage to embark on a new phase.
Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana Accessible to E-Trade Clients
In the coming months, the millions of E-Trade users, Morgan Stanley’s online brokerage platform, will be able to buy and sell Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana. A phase that could quickly expand, according to Jed Finn, the group’s wealth management head:
Clients must have access to digital assets like traditional assets, all within a familiar ecosystem.
With this move, Morgan Stanley catches up with Robinhood, already active in crypto trading. The difference lies in the clientele: E-Trade targets a more established audience, accustomed to traditional financial markets. By providing access to cryptos to this profile of investors, the bank reshapes the market balance.
A Strong Signal for Wall Street and Regulation
Until now, Morgan Stanley had limited itself to targeted investments, such as its 2021 participation in the financing of Securitize, a specialist in asset tokenization, or more recently in Bitcoin spot ETFs. The shift to direct crypto sales for its clients marks a major turning point.
The context favors this acceleration. Since the arrival of the Trump administration in January, regulatory barriers have eased, unleashing a wave of initiatives and capital towards the crypto industry. Major U.S. banks are now multiplying blockchain projects, to the extent that, according to Adam Berg, CFO of Zerohash, “some executives spend more than half of their time on on-chain innovation.”
Impact on Markets and Perspectives
The entry of a player like Morgan Stanley changes the game. It lends credibility to the integration of cryptos in traditional wealth management and should broaden institutional access to Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana. This momentum could strengthen demand for these three assets, already leading in global volumes, and intensify competition with platforms like Coinbase or Robinhood.
On a market scale, this decision exemplifies an irreversible trend: the convergence of traditional finance and digital assets. With over a billion dollars raised for Zerohash and the promise of massive deployment to E-Trade clients, Morgan Stanley positions itself at the core of this new financial architecture.
