Morgan Stanley has begun expanding its presence in the digital asset industry by introducing spot crypto trading services through the E*TRADE platform.
The service is currently only available to a limited number of users before eventually being rolled out more broadly to millions of customers in the coming months. Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana are the first three crypto assets available in the service.
Market attention is focused on the fee strategy offered by Morgan Stanley. The US investment bank has set transaction fees at around 50 basis points, or 0,5% per transaction, lower than several crypto platforms and other brokers such as Coinbase, Robinhood, and Charles Schwab.
Bloomberg analyst, Eric Balchunas believes the move shows that traditional financial institutions are becoming increasingly aggressive in entering the crypto retail market. According to him, competition over transaction fees in the crypto industry will likely continue to increase as major players from the traditional financial sector enter the space.
In addition to opening access to digital asset investment, Morgan Stanley is also leveraging E*TRADE user base, which reaches millions of accounts, to expand the distribution of crypto products directly through traditional investment platforms. Morgan Stanley’s crypto service is supported by Zero Hash as the provider of digital asset transaction infrastructure.
On the other hand, Morgan Stanley’s presence is considered capable of increasing pressure on crypto exchanges such as Coinbase. If more major financial institutions begin offering direct crypto access through their investment applications, the position exchange as the main gateway for retail investors could become increasingly pressured.
Even so, this move is also viewed as a sign of the growing adoption of digital assets among traditional financial institution.
