Charles Schwab & Co., the financial services giant with $11.8 trillion in client assets, has officially entered the spot cryptocurrency market. During its Q1 earnings call, the firm confirmed a phased rollout of spot Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) trading under the "Schwab Crypto" brand, operated through Charles Schwab Premier Bank. Access is being granted first to employees, then early-access registrants, and finally the full client base. Custody and settlement are being handled by Paxos.
A notable detail is the trading fee structure: Schwab will charge 75 basis points (0.75%) per trade, a rate substantially higher than the fees associated with popular spot Bitcoin ETFs. CEO Rick Wurster also indicated the firm will "likely" offer prediction markets in the future, specifically carving out financial event contracts. This move positions Schwab as a direct competitor to platforms like Coinbase and Robinhood for retail crypto access.
The announcement caps a significant week for institutional crypto adoption. Goldman Sachs filed for a Bitcoin income ETF, while Morgan Stanley disclosed $1.24 billion in Bitcoin ETF exposure in its Q1 13F filing and launched its own ETF with a 0.14% fee. Collectively, these moves signal deep institutional engagement with digital assets.
In a separate major development, Tether has committed up to $127.5 million to fund the recovery of Drift Protocol, a Solana-based perpetual decentralized exchange (DEX) that suffered a ~$285 million hack attributed to North Korean actors on April 1. The funding is part of a $147.5 million total package structured as a revenue-linked credit facility, designed to repay user losses over time from Drift's trading revenue.
Critically, Drift will relaunch using Tether's USDT as its settlement layer instead of Circle's USDC. This represents a strategic coup for Tether on the Solana blockchain, where USDC has historically held a 2.65x market cap advantage. The news propelled Drift's native DRIFT token up 20%. The move contrasts with Circle, which faced criticism for not freezing the stolen $232 million in USDC faster during the exploit, citing the need for a court order.
Meanwhile, regulatory pressures are mounting. CFTC Chair Mike Selig faced bipartisan pushback in a Senate hearing over the agency's aggressive defense of its jurisdiction over prediction markets and its inability to regulate offshore decentralized exchanges like Hyperliquid. Selig pointed to the stalled Clarity Act as a potential legislative fix.
The NFT sector continues to contract, with Foundation—a defining platform of the 2021 boom—announcing its shutdown after a failed sale. This follows closures of other major platforms like Nifty Gateway and Magic Eden's marketplace, leaving OpenSea as a primary survivor.
