The long-awaited final Chinese regulatory approval for the business could be granted around ‌the time of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s planned visit to Washington to meet with his American counterpart Donald Trump, reported Reuters.

The American bank, which offers corporate, institutional, and other banking services in China, in 2021, applied for a wholly-owned mainland Chinese brokerage unit licence as part of its push to ramp up its presence in the world’s second-largest economy.

“Citi, which has been hiring for the business over the last couple of years in preparation for the licence, aims to roughly double the headcount to around 100 people by the end of this year,” stated Reuters, while citing a source.

The ⁠regulatory approval from Beijing, if it happens this month, would see Citi competing with Wall Street rivals including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley for a share of growing and increasingly profitable onshore securities trading and underwriting deals in the world’s second-largest economy.

Citi’s aggressive attempt to establish a solid presence in China’s brokerage market comes at a time when the Asian giant is witnessing a growing list of technology and other companies tapping domestic equity markets for fundraising and attracting increased fund flows into the stock markets.

Wall Street giants, irrespective of the growing Sino-US geopolitical rivalry, have been expanding in the world’s second-largest economy.

The Xi Jinping administration also sees the growing access of American firms to its financial sector as a mean to attract more capital inflows.

As part of its China expansion, Citigroup will be adding personnel, including senior front-office bankers and support staff. Reports indicate that Citi will achieve this through a mix via a combination of internal transfers and external hires.

For the China brokerage unit, Citi also plans to relocate some of its bankers from Hong Kong and other Asian markets, apart from moving some of its existing mainland staff to the new business.

Citi’s American rivals are already gaining significantly in China. In 2025, profits at the wholly-owned ‌China securities ⁠unit of Goldman Sachs nearly tripled to 1.46 billion yuan (USD 217.39 million), while JPMorgan’s almost quadrupled to 984 million yuan. Morgan Stanley’s profit, on the other hand, soared sevenfold to 138 million yuan.

All three banks benefitted from surging securities trading revenue primarily from institutional clients.

Citi’s new China business unit will reportedly be seeking a regulatory nod to conduct A-share brokerage, underwriting, research, and principal trading businesses in the onshore market.

As per the sources, those offerings would complement the Wall Street giant’s existing offshore-focused team for investment banking in China that supports domestic companies’ financing activities in overseas markets.

The ⁠bank also plans to lean on its onshore corporate and commercial banking client base, which it already serves in areas such as foreign exchange, cash management, and trade finance, to win A-share equity and M&A mandates.

Citi’s new China unit will focus on sectors including technology, healthcare, and consumer and financial institutions, targeting the Asian giant’s established corporate “champions” as well as emerging players including AI and chip companies.

Citi would be entering a hyper-competitive domain, where, in addition to its Wall Street rivals, Chinese brokerages also introduce new offerings rapidly.
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The collaboration highlights Interactive Brokers’ strength as a provider of brokerage technology and white-label solutions for introducing brokers worldwide. By leveraging IBKR’s sophisticated trading infrastructure, Daol can offer clients an enhanced investing experience.

“We are pleased to work with Daol to help expand access to global equities for Korean investors,” said David Friedland, Managing Director for APAC at Interactive Brokers.

“Our powerful technology, competitive pricing and broad global market access can help institutions worldwide optimise business operations and better serve their clients,” the senior official added further.

BC Lee, Chairman of Daol Investment & Securities, remarked, “This initiative with IBKR is intended to provide Korean investors with a new investment experience directly connected to a global securities infrastructure. Through a comprehensive collaboration that includes expanding accessible markets, derivatives, and direct investment services in the Korean market for overseas investors, we plan to develop this into a long-term, two-way global investment platform.”

IBKR Brokerage Services, known for its powerful trading technology and tools to trade products, operates on over 170 markets.

The venture uses real-time market risk management and monitoring mechanisms to help client firms measure and manage trade risk exposure. The whole service comes with competitive pricing with no ticket charges or minimums and no technology, software, platform or reporting fees.

IBKR, in Q2 2026, reported a 35% profit rise, bolstered by elevated trading activity due to a sharp rally ‌in US equity markets during the period.

The brokerage was a giant gainer as the S&P 500 and Nasdaq posted strong gains during the April-to-June quarter, with investors looking past geopolitical uncertainty and remaining optimistic about AI-driven earnings growth.

The ⁠broker’s net interest income rose 23% to USD 1.06 billion, due to the higher average customer margin loans and credit balances.

Commission revenue, the amount the brokerage earns when clients execute trades, increased 30% in the reported quarter compared to the prior year, supported by higher customer trading volumes across major asset classes, including ‌equities, ⁠futures and options.

Daily average revenue trades (DARTs), which signify the average trades per day generating commissions or fees, rose 36% in the quarter to 4.82 million trades.

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Retail ‌trading remained robust during the quarter as heightened market volatility, driven in part by the Iran war and its impact on inflation expectations and the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate outlook, kept investors active.

Adjusted earnings came in at 48 cents per share, topping analysts’ average estimate of 44 cents, according to data compiled by LSEG.

While the total net revenues increased 32% year-over-year to USD 1.31 billion, transaction-based revenues increased 44% year-over-year to USD 776 million, primarily driven by event contracts revenue of USD 156 million, up over 10 times.

Options revenue reached USD 342 million, up 29%. Equities revenue touched the USD 129 million mark, with a 95% quarterly hike. Cryptocurrencies revenue stood at USD 100 million, down 38%.

Robinhood’s net interest revenues increased 9% year-over-year to USD 389 million, primarily driven by growth in interest-earning assets, while partially offset by lower short-term interest rates and securities lending activity.

Other revenues increased 54% year-over-year to USD 143 million, primarily driven by Trump Account service revenues and increased Robinhood Gold subscription revenues.

Net income increased 48% year-over-year to USD 573 million, including USD 129 million of gains primarily related to the deconsolidation of Robinhood Ventures Fund I (RVI).

“The business is firing on all cylinders. We delivered record revenues and drove new highs across equity, option, and event contract volumes, as we continue to win market share. Our product velocity continues to deliver new products for customers and drive a more diversified business, with Robinhood Legend and the Credit Card business joining our growing roster of now thirteen different business lines that have reached $100 million-plus in annualized revenues,” said Shiv Verma, Chief Financial Officer of Robinhood.

“Whether it’s the Robinhood Chain, Robinhood Ventures, or Trump Accounts, our product velocity is focused on one goal: making everyone an owner. Broad ownership is essential to a free, stable, and prosperous society,” said Vlad Tenev, Chairman and CEO of Robinhood.

However, Robinhood’s muted performance at the crypto bank can also be attributed to the rapid expansion of prediction markets, that has shifted investor focus away from the virtual currency, with analysts expecting the industry shift to play a massive role in Robinhood’s revenue mix.

Other reasons behind crypto sector’s poor run have been weaker digital asset prices, persistent market volatility and a shift in investor interest toward AI-related assets.

Interest in prediction markets surged during the 2024 ‌United States ⁠presidential election, boosting user engagement and trading activity.

“This was not merely a prediction-market beat. Robinhood delivered better-than-expected transaction revenue, NII, deposits, subscription growth and expense control simultaneously,” said Bill Birmingham, managing director at REX Financial.

Third Bridge analyst Jacob Zuller told the Reuters that prediction markets had evolved from a curiosity into arguably ⁠Robinhood’s most important growth driver. He further added that prediction markets would serve as a customer acquisition funnel for the venture.

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According to blockchain media outlet U. Today, Ripple Prime is currently strengthening its prime brokerage business linking traditional finance and digital-asset markets, with the goal of presenting the 24-hour, blockchain-based financial infrastructure as the brokerage platform’s core competitive edge.

Michael Higgins, CEO of Ripple Prime International, said in a recent interview, “This crypto winter is not a winter for digital assets. Markets are moving toward 24-hour accessibility, and that requires always-on, blockchain-based infrastructure. That is Wall Street 2.0, and Ripple Prime is leading the change.”

Ripple Prime’s growth has accelerated further since the platform acquired prime brokerage firm Hidden Road for USD 1.25 billion in October 2025. As per the Ripple Prime, its multi-asset activities have been positioned to take advantage of the growing institutional demand that is expanding across asset classes, including foreign exchange, digital assets, derivatives, swaps, and bonds, centered on clearing and financing services.

Ripple Prime is also strengthening its liquidity provision. It recently secured a USD 200 million debt facility from Neuberger Specialty Finance that will be used to expand margin financing capabilities and broaden the liquidity provision base for institutional clients.

Ripple Prime’s key strategy is to shift bank-centered payment systems to a blockchain-based structure.

“Traditional prime brokerages can post collateral only during bank business hours, creating inefficiencies that require additional capital on weekends or holidays. Ripple Prime plans to reduce such constraints by building a 24-hour collateral management system using the dollar-pegged stablecoin RLUSD,” the company remarked.

Higgins said large Wall Street banks are expected to enter the digital prime brokerage market in earnest if the regulatory framework becomes clearer.

“Existing financial institutions would not find it easy to build blockchain-based technology quickly. The biggest market maker in US equities and FX markets is no longer a bank,” he said.

Ripple Prime connects digital-asset exchanges, FX liquidity pools, and traditional stock exchanges through a single integrated technology stack and applies the same operating system. This ability has allowed the company to expand services more quickly across different asset classes.

Considering the institutional adoption of digital assets entering an expansion phase, Ripple Prime is looking to reposition itself as a comprehensive infrastructure provider spanning clearing, financing, and collateral management beyond simple trading services.

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As part of the strategic integration, Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP), “Data Streams,” and “Data Feeds” have now been made live on the Robinhood Chain mainnet, delivering verifiable data for tokenized RWAs (Real-World Assets), apart from unlocking secure interoperability across the multi-chain ecosystem.

“Via Chainlink, millions of users now have unlocked access to onchain products within the Robinhood Chain ecosystem,” Robinhood Chain stated further.

“As one of the world’s largest financial apps going all-in on blockchain infrastructure, this marks a major milestone for the mainstream consumer adoption of onchain finance. Through Chainlink, Robinhood Chain is now natively connected across chains and able to offer its users highly secure real-world assets at scale—all powered by market-leading infrastructure that secures over 70% of DeFi and has enabled more than USD 31 trillion in transaction value,” it added further.

Without institutional-grade oracle infrastructure, tokenized assets cannot scale or maintain the security required by regulated market participants. Operating as an Ethereum layer-2 network built on Arbitrum’s Orbit technology, Robinhood Chain addresses these inefficiencies with Chainlink by establishing an environment built specifically to unlock advanced onchain finance use cases for everyday Robinhood users.

“We’re excited to see Robinhood Chain adopt Chainlink as the official data and cross-chain oracle infrastructure powering Robinhood Chain and unlocking access to the on-chain economy for millions of users. This is how the world’s largest financial services apps accelerate the transition to an onchain financial system powered by Chainlink,” said Thodoris Karakostas, Director of Global Partnerships, Chainlink Labs.

“Robinhood Crypto is building the foundation for the future of investing by delivering secure access to all of our financial products directly on-chain, through Robinhood Chain. We chose Chainlink as the oracle provider for Robinhood Chain because its institutional-grade security and reliability are already trusted by the world’s largest financial institutions to scale on-chain ecosystems,” remarked Gaetan Thabot, director of product, Robinhood Crypto.

Chainlink has emerged as the industry-standard oracle platform, bringing the capital markets on-chain and, as the market leader, powering the majority of DeFi (Decentralised Finance).

“The Chainlink stack provides the essential data, interoperability, compliance, and privacy standards needed to power advanced blockchain use cases for institutional tokenized assets, lending, payments, stablecoins, and more. Since inventing decentralized oracle networks, Chainlink has enabled tens of trillions in transaction value and now secures the vast majority of DeFi,” Chainlink Labs said.

“Many of the world’s largest financial services institutions have also adopted Chainlink’s standards and infrastructure, including SWIFT, Euroclear, Mastercard, Fidelity International, UBS, S&P Dow Jones Indices, FTSE Russell, WisdomTree, ANZ, and top protocols such as Aave, Polymarket, Lido, Lighter, and many others.” Chainlink leverages a novel fee model where off-chain and on-chain revenue from enterprise adoption is converted to LINK tokens and stored in a strategic Chainlink Reserve,” it concluded.

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The approvals have now authorised Capital.com South Africa to act as both an “Over-the-Counter Derivatives Provider” and a “Category 1 Financial Services Provider”. The broker will now be able to offer CFDs across equities, commodities, indices, foreign exchange, and crypto-related products while operating under direct FSCA supervision.

While the global brokers are increasingly targeting Africa as one of the few major retail trading markets, stating that the continent remains significantly underpenetrated compared with Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, FSCA’s approval also highlights a broader trend reshaping the broking industry, with regulation emerging as a competitive weapon. As per the reports, firms are increasingly competing not only on spreads, platforms, and products, but also on the breadth and quality of their regulatory footprint.

South Africa is estimated to become a unique spot within the global retail trading industry, as, unlike other emerging markets, the nation combines a sophisticated financial sector with an established regulatory framework, a developed banking system, deep capital markets, and a large base of retail investors already familiar with leveraged products.

While the Johannesburg Stock Exchange has consolidated its place as Africa’s largest exchange by market capitalisation, the country’s asset management industry currently oversees more than USD 1 trillion in assets, according to industry estimates.

“Retail participation in forex and CFD trading has grown steadily over the last decade, making the country one of the most important markets for international brokers operating on the continent. This has led many firms to pursue local authorisation rather than serving clients through offshore entities, reported Finance Feeds.

Valentina Rzheutskaya, Executive Director at Capital.com, said, “Operating under local regulatory supervision is fundamental to how we approach market entry. The FSCA approvals define the framework within which Capital.com is permitted to operate in South Africa, including the standards we must meet around governance, conduct and risk controls.”

Compared to other jurisdictions where Capital.com already operates, the South Africa approval will fit into the company’s larger expansion strategy that increasingly focuses on regulated local operations rather than cross-border servicing. The dual-licence structure is more significant than a standard broker authorisation because each approval serves a different purpose.

“The Over-the-Counter Derivatives Provider licence allows Capital.com to execute derivative transactions under South Africa’s regulatory framework. This includes CFDs linked to equities, commodities, indices, foreign exchange markets, and crypto assets. The Category 1 Financial Services Provider licence serves a different role. It allows the company to market and promote its services locally while providing intermediary services related to approved financial products. Together, the licences create a complete operating framework that enables the broker to acquire clients, market products, and execute transactions through a locally regulated entity,” Rzheutskaya mentioned.

“This structure differs from many offshore models where brokers may possess authorisation in one jurisdiction but market products into another without a locally regulated presence,” she added.

While South Africa has introduced oversight of crypto asset service providers, the African major’s regulatory approach has generally been viewed as more accommodating, as opposed to jurisdictions that have imposed outright restrictions on crypto derivatives.

For Capital.com, the South African authorisation is the latest addition to a licensing portfolio that has expanded rapidly over the last several years. The Cyprus-based company now operates through entities regulated by the FCA in the UK, CySEC in Cyprus, ASIC in Australia, the Securities Commission of the Bahamas, the UAE Capital Markets Authority, the Bermuda Monetary Authority, Kenya’s Capital Markets Authority, and now the FSCA.

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As per the Nasdaq, despite the Iran war rattling markets earlier in 2026, retail investors, instead of selling, rotated more than USD 70 billion into ETFs (Exchange-Traded Funds) in Q1 alone, behaving more like institutional allocators managing risk in real time.

“Platforms, infrastructure, and business models now face a different kind of investor, and the industry is working to stay ahead,” the stock exchange noted during its third annual “Global Retail Executive Forum,” held in New York in early June.

The event brought together executives from across the global retail brokerage industry, nearly half from Asia, for two days of panels, working sessions, and special closed-door conversations.

“The goal was to bring together the brokers that are fuelling investing for retail investors and give them the opportunity to hear from each other on what’s working, what’s not working, and what they should be building next,” said Brandon Tepper, SVP and Global Head of Data at Nasdaq.

“What emerged were four interconnected conversations, each reflecting a different dimension of the same underlying shift,” he added further.

The first debate of the event focused on when investors want to trade, where the participants mentioned overnight trading already accounting for approximately 11% of total daily US equity volume, with pre-market activity alone growing 15-fold since 2019. Nasdaq will be launching its exchange-based 23-hour trading in December 2026 amid the increasing demand from the international clients for such services.

“Global investors want to be able to invest in U.S. markets while it’s daylight. That’s what’s pushing the entire industry,” Tepper said.

“Among Gen Z investors, 49% trade weekly and 25% trade daily, behaviour shaped by digital asset markets that already trade around the clock and an on-demand economy where friction still exists. The consumer experience has shifted to always-on. Streaming, same-day delivery, instant payments. Those consumers are becoming investors, and they’re more engaged with their trading platforms than ever. That makes the data and infrastructure underpinning those platforms even more critical,” the senior official mentioned further.

As per Tepper, more than 40% of Gen Z investors are already comfortable having AI manage their investments entirely, compared with 14% of Baby Boomers. Another 43% would trust AI with their financial information.

“But the quality of AI output depends on something less glamorous: the data underneath it. You cannot have good AI without good data. Working with clean, accurate data is the foundation of any AI. It doesn’t have to be financial data; it could be any data. But obviously in our context, that’s what we’re talking about,” he noted.

“As brokerages move to deploy AI-powered capabilities, the competitive advantage may belong less to the firms with the most sophisticated models and more to those investing in the data and information that makes those models useful,” Tepper concluded.

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The integration has been made accessible via Claude’s certified connector marketplace, allowing the American brokerage’s clients to link their existing “IBKR Accounts” using their standard login credentials within minutes.

“There are no additional fees involved and no requirement to open a separate brokerage account. The setup draws on the same APIs already used by many active IBKR clients for their own trading workflows, giving AI tools access to positions, open orders, trade history, margin details, and market data. Rather than sharing API keys or passwords with the AI provider, IBKR has opted for enterprise-level integration, meaning no authentication credentials are held on the client’s device,” Interactive said.

As per the company, its clients can generate trading instructions for equities and ETFs using market and limit orders, while further asset classes will be added in the coming days.

“Instructions produced by the AI will appear in a dedicated AI Instructions tab on the Orders and Trades page, where the client must review and approve each one before it is submitted to the market. Additional AI integrations with ChatGPT, Gemini, and Grok are currently working through certification with their respective platforms and are anticipated to follow shortly,” Fintech Global reported.

Through the Claude integration, Interactive’s clients will also be able to interrogate their portfolios in plain language, asking questions such as what percentage of holdings sit in a particular sector, which position carries the largest unrealized gain or loss, or what trades would be needed to rebalance toward a target sector weighting.

Stating that the Claude integration sits alongside a broader suite of AI-powered tools already embedded within IBKR’s platforms, CEO Milan Galik said, “Interactive Brokers has used technology for over four decades to help investors make more informed decisions and interact more efficiently with markets.”

“Investors are increasingly using artificial intelligence to research markets, analyze information, and generate ideas. We believe the next logical step is to allow clients to securely connect AI tools directly to their brokerage accounts—whether they want a simple conversational interface, deeper portfolio analysis, or the ability to develop and execute sophisticated trading strategies,” he concluded.

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Through the newly launched products, customers will now be able to connect third-party agents to Robinhood through “Model Context Protocol Servers” for both the broking and Robinhood Banking.

The move also makes Robinhood one of the first mainstream consumer finance brands to give outside agents direct, sanctioned access to a retail broking and a credit line, instead of forcing developers to scrape the app or rely on unofficial application programming interfaces.

“Agentic Trading runs through a dedicated account that sits separate from a user’s main portfolio, with the agent restricted to whatever funds the customer deposits into it. Customers receive push notifications for every trade and can watch a real-time activity feed and profit-and-loss view inside the Robinhood apps. The connection can be cut at any time. The beta supports equities only at launch, with options, crypto, event contracts, futures and prediction markets to follow,” Robinhood said.

Robinhood is pitching the AI feature as a way for customers to covert strategies they would otherwise execute by hand, including portfolio rebalancing, sector-concentration analysis and automated mean-reversion trades. As per the mobile-first broking, agents will, where appropriate, surface a trade preview for the customer to approve before execution.

The Agentic Credit Card combines an AI agent with a virtual card linked to a customer’s Robinhood Gold Card account. Talking more about this, Robinhood said, “Spending limits, monthly caps and a manual-approval toggle are set during configuration, and the agent never sees the primary card number or other account details. Agent-driven purchases earn the same 3% cash back as the underlying Gold Card. Support for the forthcoming Robinhood Platinum Card will follow when that product ships later this year.”

The spending limits set by the Agentic Credit Card will enable Robinhood customers to buy limited-release sneakers below a target price, book restaurant reservations and fill small-business shopping lists.

“Our mission has always been to democratise finance for all, and now, that mission extends to AI agents,” said Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev.

The launch of Robinhood’s Agentic Credit Card comes as payment networks and platforms race to build infrastructure for agent-initiated commerce. Stripe, Visa, Amazon’s Bedrock AgentCore Payments and Google have all rolled out tooling aimed at giving agents the ability to transact. However, Robinhood has become the first major American retail broking to extend that model to securities trading.

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“Momentum Peak Trade is offering retail and high-net-worth investors a 7.6% interest rate on available account equity, calculated weekly and applied without minimum trading volume requirements. The product positions the firm against both traditional brokerages and the high-yield savings accounts that have absorbed significant retail deposits in recent years,” reported Business Insider Africa.

The 7.6% rate on available account equity, offered by the broking firm, reportedly sits above current global benchmark deposit rates, apart from reflecting a broader industry trend in which brokerages have begun deploying interest on uninvested cash, with the goal of retaining clients.

This allows traders to keep capital deployable for market opportunities while accumulating yield during inactive periods, addressing the opportunity cost of holding cash between positions, a long-standing friction point bothering retail trading.

“Momentum Peak Trade does not require lockups, minimum trading thresholds, or large deposit minimums to qualify, according to materials published by the company. The company has structured its offering around eight account levels, beginning with an Intro tier at USD 300 and extending through Basic, Plus, Extra, Advanced, Premium, and Exclusive to VIP at USD 250,000. Spreads tighten across the structure, beginning at 1.6 pips at the Plus level and compressing to 0.8 pips at VIP. Maximum leverage is held constant at 1:200 across all tiers,” Business Insider Africa stated.

Momentum Peak Trade’s strategy of yield enhancement involves cashback rewards that scale alongside investment size, ranging from standard rates at lower tiers to a 5x multiplier at the VIP level. Also, premium tier clients will end up gaining access to up to 10 protected trades carrying USD 200 in credit each, apart from invitations to company events, long-term financial planning consultations, and advanced mentoring programmes.

Momentum Peak Trade is reportedly pursuing a wider client capital range than typical retail brokings, with the VIP threshold positioning the broking firm closer to private wealth territory while the intro tier remains accessible to first-time investors. The platform, as of now, provides access to six asset classes through a unified account structure.

The venture’s equity coverage spans blue-chip stocks and growth equities across technology, healthcare, finance, energy, and consumer sectors. The foreign exchange offering, on the other hand, includes major pairs, minor crosses, and emerging-market currencies, addressing both established trading flows and the growing investor interest in the developing markets.

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