Digital assets trading platform Bakkt says it’s gearing up to support retail traders.
Mike Blandina, chief product officer at Bakkt, confirms the company is looking to launch retail brokerage accounts featuring cryptocurrencies.
“[We want to] unlock the value of digital assets through consumer payments…Billions of dollars in digital assets exist today across the world, such as bitcoin, cashback and rewards, in addition to other forms of digital value relied upon by consumers and merchants.
A key feature of the model we’ve designed is to support a superset of digital assets, including cryptocurrencies, as seamlessly as investors transact in stocks in a retail brokerage account.”
Blandina adds that Bakkt’s vision is to include a merchant portal that will allow consumers to spend their crypto on everyday purchases at stores like Starbucks – their first launch partner.
Images of “Bakkt Insider” emails are circulating on Twitter. They show the company may be testing a consumer app that will allow users to manage, store, trade and transfer their crypto assets.
“Our consumer app is currently being tested as we approach launch, just one year after our official announcement.”
Meanwhile, Bakkt’s Bitcoin futures contracts are gaining steam.
On November 8, 2019, the exchange set a new all-time daily record with 1,756 Bitcoin (BTC) futures contracts worth roughly $15.4 million.