Kraken launches tokenised US stocks in EU as competition with Robinhood intensifies

Kraken is upping the ante against Robinhood.

On Wednesday, the US crypto exchange announced the launch of its tokenised stock trading product, xStocks, across the European Union, making it available for millions of eligible clients.

The launch will grant access to representations of more than 60 US-listed stocks and exchange-traded funds.

In the US, the xStocks trading boom has catapulted tokenised stocks to become the fastest-growing subsector of crypto’s $25 billion real-world asset niche.

“Expanding xStocks to the European Union was a natural next step,” said Mark Greenberg, Kraken’s global head of consumer, in comments shared with DL News. “For too long, it’s been unnecessarily challenging to gain exposure to US markets, and with xStocks we’re removing many of the barriers.”

This summer, tokenised stocks have become the latest crypto battleground. Robinhood, the $105 billion trading platform, rolled out similar services across Europe in June.

Kraken didn’t respond to a request for comment about how it plans to compete with Robinhood’s service and what customers are eligible for the new service.

Competition heating up

The initiatives come as competition in the crypto space is heating up.

Crypto-native firms like Kraken are increasingly fighting over market share with fintech firms and Wall Street giants who have been encouraged to tap into digital assets thanks to the pro-crypto tilt of the current US administration.

Kraken is pitching xStocks as a frictionless entry point to US stock markets, bypassing traditional hurdles such as high fees, market-hour restrictions, and settlement delays.

Kraken is also broadening its reach into tokenisation. Its initial rollout placed xStocks on Solana; support for Ethereum and BNB Chain is coming next

The firm says its goal is to make equities as composable as stablecoins in web3 ecosystems.

IPO plans

The EU xStocks rollout also marks Kraken’s latest move to expand its services.

Last week, it launched US-regulated crypto futures trading. In April, Kraken launched commission-free trading for US equities, which also put it on a collision course with Robinhood, which made its fortune with a similar product.

Last week, Kraken acquired Breakout, a proprietary trading platform. It’s the latest acquisition from Kraken, who bought NinjaTrader, a retail futures trading platform, for $1.5 billion in March.

The initiative comes as Kraken builds momentum ahead of a rumoured 2026 public listing. In March, a Kraken spokesperson told Decrypt that a public listing is on the company’s roadmap.

In a separate interview with DL News, co-CEO Arjun Sethi said that there is no timeline for when the company may file for an initial public offering.