Robinhood Expands Cryptocurrency Suite in Europe, US

Fifteen years ago, a young individual was living in a small apartment near the French Riviera, working at a McDonald's during the day and teaching themselves to code at night. Today, that same person is the senior vice president of Robinhood's cryptocurrency business, returning to Cannes to witness the company's global expansion.

Back in 2008, with no connections, capital, or business background, this individual dropped out of university just before the start of the academic year at the nearby University of Nice. They founded their first fintech project—a no-code payment company that enabled small businesses to create e-commerce websites without hiring programmers. The idea was to empower non-technical users to build their own platforms, similar to the model later popularized by Shopify.

The timing was perfect. The early 2010s saw a boom in e-commerce, and the tools developed by this individual helped small businesses thrive. It also gave them a clear view of the global financial system's vulnerabilities and high costs. Stories from friends in Greece about frozen bank accounts during the euro crisis, and the struggles of platform merchants with high fees, payment rejections, and fraud, all highlighted the need for a better solution. The release of the Bitcoin whitepaper seemed to offer that solution.

“I thought, ‘This is the ultimate solution,’” the senior vice president recalled.

Today, along the same coastline where they once worked, the Belle Époque-style Château de la Croisette stands as a testament to their involvement in creating Robinhood's most ambitious cryptocurrency product suite. On Monday, the company announced a range of new offerings, including tokenized US stock ETFs for Europe, crypto staking services in the US, perpetual contracts for qualified EU traders, and a Layer 2 blockchain optimized for real asset settlement and 24/7 trading.

Sitting in the once-unreachable Carlton Hotel, the senior vice president reflected, “It's surreal. When I was younger, I never imagined I'd be staying here one day.”