Morgan Stanley is about to take one of the biggest steps on Wall Street into the Bitcoin space by offering digital assets trading to retail clients through its E*Trade platform.

The rollout, expected in the first half of 2026, will give E*Trade clients access to bitcoin, as well as altcoins such as ethereum and solana.

Today, the digital assets market is nearly $4 trillion, with Bitcoin alone over $2.3 trillion. For Morgan Stanley, one of the largest banks in America, it’s a chance to meet growing demand and stay competitive with rivals like Robinhood and Charles Schwab.

Related: $10T Giant Charles Schwab to Launch Spot Bitcoin Trading by 2026

To make it happen, the banking giant is partnering with Zerohash, a Chicago-based infrastructure provider for digital assets. Zerohash will handle liquidity, custody and settlement. The bank has also taken an investment stake in Zerohash.

“We are well underway in preparing to offer crypto trading through a partner model to E-Trade clients in the first half of 2026,” said Jed Finn, Morgan Stanley’s head of wealth management, in a memo to clients.

Zerohash has grown fast in the fintech space. The company recently reached “unicorn” status, raising $104 million at a $1 billion valuation in a funding round led by Interactive Brokers with Morgan Stanley as an investor.

Morgan Stanley executives say offering bitcoin trading is just the beginning. The bank is also working on a wallet solution that will allow it to be the custodian for clients’ digital assets.

“Offering clients the ability to trade crypto is the tip of the iceberg,” Finn said. “We see immense power in the cryptocurrency space, not just with crypto as an investment for our clients, but also around DLT (distributed ledger technology) and tokenization more broadly.”

Morgan Stanley is not alone in entering retail bitcoin trading. Just a few years ago, most big banks limited digital assets exposure to investment funds for high-net-worth clients. Now, firms are moving towards direct trading access for everyday investors.

Robinhood has been a pioneer in this space, generating significant revenue from digital asset trading and even buying the Bitstamp exchange for $200 million earlier this year.

Charles Schwab has taken a more cautious approach, offering digital asset exposure through ETFs and mutual funds.

For the wealth management leader, this is a natural progression.

They bought E*Trade in 2020 for $13 billion, adding a retail-focused platform with over 5 million users. Combining that base with digital assets could give them a strong foothold in the growing bitcoin market.

Interestingly, Morgan Stanley’s move comes shortly after their own chief investment officer, Mike Wilson, left bitcoin out of his recommended portfolio strategy in favor of gold. Wilson said bitcoin is too volatile to be a reliable inflation hedge.

The bank’s leadership seems to be taking a different approach.

CEO James Gorman has said Morgan Stanley is exploring not just bitcoin trading but the broader transactional potential of blockchain. They’ve also given their financial advisors the green light to pitch spot bitcoin ETFs to eligible clients.

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Filed under: Altcoins - @ September 25, 2025 12:00 pm