Morgan Stanley brings crypto trading with lower fees than rivals

Morgan Stanley is expanding its digital assets push by rolling out crypto trading on its E*Trade platform, positioning the offering as a lower-cost option to established retail crypto services.

The bank is currently running a pilot that charges the E*Trade users a fee of 50 basis points on transaction value, according to Bloomberg. That’s notably lower cost than other major players, including Coinbase, Robinhood and Charles Schwab, which charge 60 to 95 basis points.

Morgan Stanley’s Head of Wealth Management, Jed Finn, said the initiative goes beyond offering cheaper crypto trading and is aimed at “disintermediating the disintermediators,” framing it as a broader structural shift in how clients access digital assets.

The investment banking giant plans to roll the service out to all 8.6 million ETrade customers later this year.

The latest offering builds on a series of crypto-related moves in recent months, including the launch of a Bitcoin exchange-traded fund, with planned products tied to ether and solana. Morgan Stanley has also advanced efforts on the infrastructure side, applying for a national trust bank charter that would enable it to directly custody digital assets.

Sources told Bloomberg that the bank is also mulling services that enable conversation of crypto holdings into exchange-traded products without selling and is preparing for potential tokenized equity trading later this year.

These moves are set to amplify competition in a market where Coinbase generated $3.32 billion in consumer transaction revenue in 2025, while Robinhood reported nearly $1 billion in crypto-related revenue.