Kraken co-CEO David Ripley told Axios on June 9 that virtually all traditional financial services firms will offer Bitcoin and Ethereum to clients, calling it a defining story of 2026. Banks, brokerages, and wealth managers are responding to demand from retail, institutional, and UHNW clients, with AI, stablecoins, and tokenization cited as converging tailwinds accelerating the timeline.
For Armada's crypto repo desk, this trend validates the demand thesis but also signals intensifying competition from incumbent dealers building out digital asset lending and custody capabilities. Armada's differentiation via no-rehypothecation policy and SOC 2 positioning becomes more valuable as institutional clients become more sophisticated about counterparty risk, but the window to establish relationships with hedge funds and family offices ahead of full bank entry is narrowing.