The head of Robinhood Crypto personally stated: Meme+ tokenizing US stocks is a “barbell” customer acquisition strategy, and all business lines have already achieved hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue
Original title: Johann Kerbrat: Inside Robinhood's Crypto Strategy (Full Coverage)
Source: TheRollup
Original text compilation: Deep Wave TechFlow
Statement of interests
Johann Kerbrat is a Robinhood executive and is responsible for the entire product line of the crypto business (including Robinhood Chain, tokenized stocks, pledge services, and perpetual contracts). Her remuneration and equity incentives are directly linked to $HOOD's share price. All discussions on the Robinhood Chain in this issue relate to the business it is directly responsible for. The title uses an “insider's perspective” rather than an “analysis” to reflect this interest.
summary
Three weeks after the main network of Robinhood Chain was launched, the weekly DEX volume exceeded $3 billion, the number of transactions exceeded 105 million, and the TVL exceeded 300 million dollars. Johann Kerbrat explained the chain's strategic logic in detail for the first time in a podcast: why the “barbell” layout (meme tokens + real-world assets in parallel) was chosen, why the Arbitrum technology stack was used instead of self-built L1, and how to gradually move Robinhood's 27 million deposit account onto the chain. He made it clear that the competition is focused on “expanding the cake” rather than grabbing shares with Base, and revealed that tokenized stocks have covered 120+ countries and 90+ targets, and will expand to international stocks and private equity markets in the future.
Key citations
“Our philosophy is to make the chain permissionless and open to everything. Whether it's a meme or an RWA, there are many products that people can't resist. We are deeply integrating with the chain.”
“Robinhood has 27 million deposit accounts. For these users, DeFi is still too complicated and requires too much technical knowledge. We're thinking about how to bring in a good DeFi product while making it easy to use and use without creating a wallet or managing private keys.”
“I think competition is ultimately beneficial to the customer. We cut fees by a large margin when the crypto exchange went live. It's still too early on the chain, and it's too early to discuss market share.”
“We've only been online for three weeks. If you're thinking about bringing tens of millions of users to the chain, bringing more utility, and bringing something that people actually use (not just a moment of fluctuation), then you're thinking about a long-term revenue stream.”
“We don't want to see all of Robinhood's trading activity going to the chain next year. That was a bit of a dream. But if you can find things you can't do with traditional methods, such as international stocks and 24/7 trading, chains can be the solution.”
1. Three weeks of online data: $3 billion weekly trading volume is only the starting point
The host opened with a set of numbers: After the launch of the Robinhood Chain main network, weekly DEX transactions reached $3 billion, more than 50 million transactions, more than 1 million addresses, and TVL over $300 million.
Kerbrat's response was straightforward: this data has already been surpassed. He said that the number of transactions that morning had already surpassed 105 million. He described the state of the team as “very excited”. The core idea is that this figure reflects the intensity of market demand for products on the chain.
He specifically emphasized that the ecosystem was ready to accept developers from the beginning, rather than build it first and then wait for others to come. This is different from many paths where L2 goes live and then slowly drains.
II. “Barbell” Strategy: Why Meme and RWA Go Hand in Hand
The host mentioned an interesting phenomenon: Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev described the on-chain ecosystem as a “barbell” structure with meme tokens on one end and real world assets (RWA) on the other, and said “you have two wolves in your heart.”
Kerbrat explained the internal thinking. From day one, the chain was set to be permissionless (permissionless) and open to all types of apps. Meme tokens bring in market makers and DeFi users, while RWA serves users around the world who are unable to easily buy US stocks and ETFs. There is no contradiction between the two; rather, they each attract different groups.
He also mentioned several integrated products that have already been launched: Robinhood Earn (receiving stablecoin earnings through on-chain agreements within the main app) and tokenized stocks (tradable in 120+ countries through Robinhood Wallet).
The host asked about the differences between this and traditional financial products. Kerbrat cites the problems with the traditional system: wire transfers can only be operated between 9:30 and 4:00, commission-free brokerage firms also only operate during opening hours on weekdays, and options and futures contracts expire. The on-chain version is a better solution from a product perspective.
3. How to Move 27 Million Accounts to the Chain: Integration of DeFi and CeFi
Kerbrat gave a key figure: Robinhood has 27 million deposit accounts. Most of these users have not been exposed to DeFi because DeFi is still complex and requires a great deal of technical knowledge.
His plan is “the best of both worlds”: using DeFi's underlying technology to provide high returns, and Robinhood's front-end to provide simple UX/UI and security protection. Robinhood Earn is an example. Users can earn on-chain earnings in the main app without having to create their own wallets or manage private keys.
He defined this trend as “the convergence of CeFi and DeFi”: centralized platforms use blockchain technology to make better products while maintaining a user-friendly experience.
Regarding the technical implementation of tokenized stocks, Kerbrat revealed the “just-in-time tokenization” (just-in-time tokenization) mechanism. Traditional DEX listings require a liquidity pool to be set up in advance, and since Robinhood is already a brokerage firm and holds these stocks, it can quickly move stocks onto the chain when users need to trade. The bottom layer uses a combination of prop AMM, standard AMM, RFQ, and classic pools to ensure a good price at all times.
Currently, there are 90+ stock tokens on the chain, but he believes this is just the starting point; in the future, it will expand to more asset classes such as international stocks and private equity markets.
4. Why use Arbitrum: the logic of not building your own L1
The host asked a technical architecture question: Why use Arbitrum's technology stack instead of building a chain of your own.
Kerbrat's answer was pragmatic. Robinhood wanted to focus on what he was good at: making good UX/UI and financial products, rather than rebuilding something that already exists. Achieving Ethereum-level security and decentralization took a long time, and went through many decisions (migration from PoW to PoS, collaboration between multiple foundations). The security of using Ethereum directly and the liquidity of the EVM ecosystem are more reasonable choices.
Reasons for choosing Arbitrum as the L2 technology stack include: Stylus (allows smart contracts to be written in any programming language), extremely fast block generation speed (financial products require high speed), and low gas fees (fees can be kept low even during periods of high transaction volume). He also mentioned that when on-chain activity surged last week, gas fees were actively lowered to ensure that the user experience was not affected.
Regarding the Ethereum “rent” dispute (Robinhood Chain earns more than $1 million in revenue, but only paid 1-2% to Ethereum), Kerbrat believes that this is Ethereum's default mechanism setting, which is unfair and unfair. His perspective is long-term: if Robinhood can bring tens of millions of users to the chain and bring real usage scenarios, this will eventually become a long-term source of revenue for the Ethereum ecosystem.
5. Competition with Base: Grow the cake rather than grab a share
The host mentioned the “artificial competition” between Robinhood Chain and Coinbase Base on social media. Base recently acknowledged the failure of social experiments and turned in a different direction, while Robinhood is also exploring the possibility of on-chain social transactions.
Kerbrat's attitude towards competition is clear: competition is good for customers. Back then, when Robinhood launched crypto trading, it directly cut fees by a large margin, which ultimately benefited users. But now it's too early to discuss market share. Robinhood Chain has only been around for three weeks, and Base has been running for a year or two.
He used a number to compare: Currently, only a very small percentage of the global population holds tokenized assets. His goal is to make the cake bigger so that more people around the world can own assets rather than grab shares from existing small plates. Regarding Base's social experiments, he said, “It's normal to try something new; sometimes it fails, and sometimes it succeeds.”
Robinhood's focus is on financial products: Earn, spot trading, perpetual contracts. These are areas where they excel and can bring value.
6. The selection logic of DeFi partners
The moderator listed the partners announced by Robinhood Chain at its launch: Morpho (loan vault), Lighter (perpetual contract), 0x (aggregation and quotation API), Chainlink (oracle), and LayerZero (cross-chain).
Kerbrat explains the three criteria for choosing a partner. First, Robinhood is a listed company with multiple licenses around the world, and partners must understand and cooperate with compliance requirements. Second, you need to be able to create unique experiences. For example, when cooperating with Morpho, it goes far beyond simply accessing the API. It requires customized stable interest rates, insurance mechanisms, and exclusive UX, and takes a lot of time for in-depth discussion and joint development. Third, it is necessary to differentiate from competing products.
Regarding the timeline for perpetual contracts (perps) to enter the main US app, Kerbrat said that regulations are still being clarified. Even if the CLARITY Act is passed, perpetual contracts are another major issue. Currently, through the partnership between Robinhood Wallet and Lighter, users can experience perpetual contract transactions. He also revealed that Bitstamp (a European trading platform acquired by Robinhood) is already expanding perpetual contracts, from crypto to commodity and ETF contracts.
7. From brokerage firms to super applications: $HOOD's investment logic
The last topic went back to the investment perspective. The host asked: What does holding $HOOD stock mean now?
Kerbrat depicts Robinhood's “super apps”: stocks, options, futures, prediction markets, crypto, credit cards (Platinum cards just released the same day), banking services, and AI-brokered transactions (MCP is already available). The core is to make an app that meets all the financial needs of users at different stages of life.
He specifically mentioned the lack of financial education: young people can't learn about finance in school, but they need to start considering retirement plans after high school. Robinhood wants to focus on financial education; IRA accounts are an example.
Looking at the business model, at present, all business lines have achieved nine digits (hundreds of millions of dollars) of revenue. The revenue sources are diversified, and it is no longer just a pure trading platform. Regarding the revenue of the chain itself, Kerbrat admits that it is now prioritizing adoption over pure revenue. The gas fee setting is a balancing act: too low will be misused by spam transactions and robots, and too high will hinder adoption. We are currently in the “optimization for adoption” rather than “optimization for revenue” stage.
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