Crypto Exchange Bybit Moves From Stock CFDs to Real US Shares

Bybit began offering trading in more than 1,000 US-listed stocks and exchange-traded funds on Monday, allowing clients to pay for purchases in the USDC stablecoin. The Dubai-based crypto exchange said orders are routed to Alpaca, a US broker-dealer that also keeps the shares in custody, so clients receive an economic interest in the underlying securities rather than exposure to a price contract.

The launch moves the company beyond the equity derivatives it has carried since June 2025, when it listed stock contracts for difference on Apple, Tesla and 76 other names. Those CFDs continue to sit on a separate MetaTrader 5 account, next to the 24/7 FX perpetuals Bybit added to its crypto derivatives account last month. Co-founder and CEO Ben Zhou linked the new stock service to the "New Financial Platform" strategy the exchange outlined in January, which extended its trading business into banking and custody. "Stocks are an important part of our evolution into The New Financial Platform," Zhou said.

Access and structure

Bybit said the service is offered through Infra Capital Limited, an introducing broker regulated by the Financial Services Commission of Mauritius, while Alpaca Securities LLC, a member of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, handles clearing, settlement and custody. Clients can buy fractional shares, trade during US pre-market and after-hours sessions and pay no commission on eligible trades. Cash dividends are converted from dollars into USDC and credited to the client's Unified Trading Account, with voting rights planned for a later phase. Access is restricted to verified clients in permitted jurisdictions, which the announcement did not name. Bybit says it serves more than 80 million users.

The product arrives as equity-linked perpetual contracts on crypto exchanges have become the fastest-growing segment of those venues. Volume in such contracts reached $141 billion in June, up from $45 billion in May, according to TokenInsight data. Kraken has taken a comparable route to Alpaca, signing up the broker in April 2025 to execute trades in more than 11,000 US stocks and ETFs for American clients, and later opening over 7,000 US equities to European Economic Area clients in August under a MiFID II authorization held by its Cypriot entity. In July, Kraken parent Payward and Canada's BMO supplied $300 million of debt within a $435 million financing package for Alpaca.

Not every crypto-native firm expects traders to favour ownership. Kaledora Kiernan-Linn, CEO of onchain derivatives venue Ostium, told FinanceMagnates.com in February that DeFi would disrupt the CFD broker market within five years. "It's capital efficiency," she said, arguing that traders betting on earnings or macro events would rather not lock up capital in shares when derivatives require only a fraction. Ostium launched CFD-style trading in stocks, commodities and FX from clients' own wallets in April, hedging trades through institutional partners including Jump, and estimates the CFD market at $10 trillion in monthly volume.