The amount of Ether bridged to Robinhood’s new layer-2 blockchain exceeded $70 million in just the first week, according to Token Terminal.
Robinhood Chain, an EVM-compatible Arbitrum-based layer-2 network that uses $ETH as its native gas token, launched on July 1 with the company describing it as “AI-native and purpose-built for real-world assets.”
“If adoption continues, the chain could become a meaningful new source of demand for $ETH,” said Token Terminal on Thursday.
Robinhood has also offered tokenized stocks to customers in more than 120 countries, responding to a surging demand for tokenized US equities. Ethereum and its layer-2 scaling networks have been a popular choice for tokenized real-world assets (RWA) with more than 50% market share, according to RWA.xyz, and this move could cement that position even further.
Turning liquidity into economic activity
“Robinhood Chain is rapidly turning liquidity into economic activity,” said Token Terminal in a separate post on X.
Robinhood Chain’s daily active users reached 194,000 while daily revenue has grown to $39,000, equivalent to a $14 million annualized revenue run rate, within the chain’s first week, it said.
DefiLlama, a decentralized finance data platform, shows similar figures, showing Robinhood Chain has a total value locked of 46,748 $ETH, worth around $83 million at current market prices. Thursday’s inflows alone totaled 31,855 $ETH, or around $55 million.
Uniswap founder Hayden Adams said Friday that most of what is happening on the Robinhood Chain is $ETH-denominated.
“It’s the base pair for trading, the highest volume asset, and the gas token to pay for blockspace. It also burns $ETH on L1 to pay data storage fees,” he added.
$ETH bridged to Robinhood Chain tops $70 million. Source: Token Terminal
Andri Fauzan Adziima, research lead at Bitrue Research Institute, told Cointelegraph that it was “strongly bullish” and early volume “validates the L2 flywheel,” as a “meaningful new demand sink.”
“By using $ETH as the native gas token on this high-velocity Arbitrum L2, every transaction I track creates direct, recurring demand while locking capital and onboarding Robinhood’s massive user base.”
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Tim Sun, HashKey Group senior researcher, said it was “a clear, structural positive for $ETH.”
“For Ethereum, the most direct benefit is that Robinhood Chain uses $ETH for gas,” he said. “As bridged assets, wallet addresses, and on-chain transactions grow, new demand for $ETH is generated.”
“However, the deeper significance lies not just in how much gas is consumed, but in Robinhood’s choice to build its own on-chain financial ecosystem within the Ethereum network. This further solidifies the Ethereum mainnet’s position as the ultimate settlement layer and liquidity foundation for tokenized assets.”
Bulls argue Ethereum’s long-term growth thesis comes from RWA tokenization, agentic AI payments, institutional adoption and network upgrades, such as Glamsterdam, expected before the end of 2026, which is expected to increase layer 1 capacity.
$ETH prices ticked up on Friday to reach $1,775 but remain at multi-year bear market lows, down 64% from their August 2025 peak.
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