Charles Schwab has added Bitcoin, Ether trading to its $13 trillion platform

Charles Schwab has added direct Bitcoin and Ether trading to its retail brokerage platform at a 0.75% transaction fee, putting crypto inside a business that reported $13.1 trillion in client assets and 39.8 million active brokerage accounts at the end of the second quarter.
Summary

• Charles Schwab has rolled out direct Bitcoin and Ether trading at a 0.75% transaction fee.
• Schwab reported $13.1 trillion in client assets and 39.8 million active brokerage accounts in the second quarter.
• The brokerage has started testing crypto transfers after launching spot trading without deposits or withdrawals.
• Morgan Stanley's E*Trade has priced crypto trading at 0.5%, adding pressure on fees charged by crypto exchanges.
• Schwab is also exploring stablecoins and plans to extend crypto trading, transfers and custody to its advisor platform.

According to Schwab's second-quarter results and comments from CEO Rick Wurster, the phased rollout that started May 13 has progressed as planned, while the company has begun a crypto transfers pilot and taken an equity stake in infrastructure provider Paxos.

The service initially supports Bitcoin and Ether, with Charles Schwab Premier Bank holding client assets and Paxos providing trade execution and sub-custody. Schwab set the transaction fee at 75 basis points and launched without crypto deposits or withdrawals, while clients in New York and Louisiana were excluded from the initial rollout.

Schwab had already confirmed its launch plans in April, when a spokesperson said the company remained on schedule to introduce spot Bitcoin and Ether trading during the first half of 2026. A waitlist was opened ahead of the rollout, which followed an employee pilot.

Schwab crypto trading reaches an existing retail base

When Schwab Crypto began rolling out on May 13, eligible clients gained the ability to trade BTC and ETH alongside stocks, exchange-traded funds and other investments through the same Schwab account.

The distribution network behind the product has continued to expand. Schwab reported record second-quarter revenue of $7.1 billion, up 21% from a year earlier, while daily average trades climbed 57% to 11.9 million.

Core net new assets reached about $120 billion during the quarter, and clients opened another 1.4 million brokerage accounts. Total client assets stood at $13.08 trillion as of June 30, up 22% year over year, while active brokerage accounts reached 39.8 million.

Wurster has attributed part of the increase in trading activity to younger investors and greater use of AI-driven investing tools. The company expects that engagement to continue rather than disappear with the current market cycle.
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Crypto entered the platform after Schwab spent months assessing demand from its existing customers. Wurster previously said clients held about $25 billion in crypto exchange-traded products through Schwab and were asking to keep digital assets with their stocks, bonds and cash instead of maintaining accounts on separate platforms.

Interest was also coming from potential customers. In April 2025, Wurster said traffic to Schwab's crypto website had risen 400%, with roughly 70% of visitors coming from people who were not Schwab clients.

The rollout has continued despite weaker conditions across the crypto market. Bitcoin is trading near $63,000, while industry spot volumes declined during the second quarter. Schwab digital currencies research and strategy director Jim Ferraioli said in June that Bitcoin had lost some of its momentum appeal as investors moved toward AI stocks, commodities and anticipated initial public offerings.

Schwab has nevertheless kept the product on its planned schedule. Wurster had previously described direct crypto access as a response to customers who wanted to consolidate assets they already held elsewhere rather than a product designed around a particular Bitcoin price cycle.

Traditional brokers are competing on crypto fees

Schwab's arrival has also put its transaction price into direct competition with crypto exchanges and other established financial firms.

At 75 basis points per trade, Schwab charges less than Fidelity's roughly 1% spread but more than Morgan Stanley's E*Trade, which introduced a flat 50 basis point charge for its crypto service.

Morgan Stanley launched its E*Trade pilot on May 6 with Bitcoin, Ether and Solana trading through Zerohash. The brokerage plans to make the service available to all 8.6 million E*Trade clients later in 2026 and has also been working on a proprietary digital wallet.

The product gave Morgan Stanley one additional cryptocurrency at launch and priced each transaction one-third below Schwab's 75 basis points. Zerohash supplies the infrastructure, while Morgan Stanley also participated in the company's $104 million Series D-2 funding round in 2025.

The fee difference puts both brokerages against crypto-native platforms that have historically earned more from retail transactions.

Coinbase generated about $452 million in consumer transaction revenue on $25.8 billion of consumer trading volume during the second quarter, equivalent to an implied take rate of roughly 1.75% based on the company's reported figures.

Its overall transaction revenue fell during the quarter as weaker crypto trading activity hit the business. Coinbase reported a $359.5 million net loss and recorded another quarterly revenue miss, while consumer transaction revenue fell about 30% from a year earlier.

Subscriptions and services have become a larger part of Coinbase's business as the company expands revenue sources outside direct trading. Stablecoin economics, institutional services and other subscription products now account for a substantial portion of its revenue, while its share of global crypto trading has continued to increase.

Traditional brokerages, meanwhile, can offer crypto to customers who already use their platforms for securities, cash management and wealth products. Morgan Stanley executives have described the E*Trade strategy in similar terms, positioning crypto as another product clients can access without leaving the firm's financial ecosystem.

Morgan Stanley has continued adding digital-asset services around that model. In June, the bank partnered with Galaxy Digital to provide eligible wealth-management clients with a route to use crypto holdings for access to spot investment products, alongside the direct BTC, ETH and SOL trading already being tested through E*Trade.

Bitcoin ETFs and direct crypto now sit under one login

Schwab's direct trading service also gives clients a choice between holding Bitcoin and Ether themselves through the brokerage or using crypto investment products without moving to another platform.

Before direct trading arrived, Schwab customers could already gain exposure through Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs, futures and the Schwab Crypto Thematic ETF. The May rollout added direct ownership to the same account structure.

Wurster previously said Schwab clients wanted crypto "alongside their stocks, bonds and cash, not off to the side on a different app." He also said some customers had asked to bring digital assets held elsewhere back to Schwab because they trusted the brokerage with their other investments.

Transfers therefore form the next part of the product. Although deposits and withdrawals were unavailable at launch, Schwab said during its July earnings update that a crypto transfers pilot was starting.

The company is also preparing to extend direct digital-asset services beyond self-directed retail accounts. In June, Schwab set a mid-2027 target for adding spot crypto trading, transfers and custody to its advisor platform, although the timing could change.

Schwab officials said advisers still rely heavily on exchange-traded products for client crypto exposure, but demand for direct holdings has increased among customers who already own digital assets elsewhere. Adding transfers and custody would allow advisers to manage those holdings within the same platform used for other client assets.

Brokerages are adding more crypto services

Trading remains limited to Bitcoin and Ether at Schwab, with no staking or retail stablecoin currently offered, while some competing financial firms have already started adding more parts of the crypto product stack.

Fidelity introduced its Fidelity Digital Dollar earlier in 2026, adding a dollar-backed stablecoin to a digital-asset business that already includes crypto trading and custody.

Schwab has also discussed stablecoins. Wurster has said the brokerage has been talking with bank consortia while considering its own route, although the company has not announced a stablecoin launch.

Tokenized securities remain under consideration as well. Wurster has questioned what tokenization would solve for assets that already trade at little or no commission, but said during the July earnings call that Schwab would be prepared to serve customers if they eventually wanted securities delivered in another format.

Other large investment platforms have been moving further into digital assets after previously limiting access. Vanguard began allowing third-party crypto ETFs on its brokerage platform in December 2025, including products tied to Bitcoin, Ether, XRP and Solana, while continuing to exclude memecoin products and saying it had no plans at the time to launch its own crypto funds.

By July, Vanguard was recruiting a digital-assets head to develop a multiyear strategy covering tokenization, stablecoins, custody, wallets, settlement infrastructure and potential client products.

The job description calls for the executive to help determine where Vanguard should build its own digital-asset capabilities, work with outside providers, or hold back from particular products, with responsibility spanning both blockchain infrastructure and regulated financial services.
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