Tokenized stocks have been a talking point in crypto circles for years. Arcus, a new decentralized exchange built by the dYdX team in partnership with Robinhood Crypto, is trying to make them a reality at scale.
Eddie Zhang, CEO and founder of Arcus, recently sat down with Ryan Baggs to walk through what the platform is building and where it’s headed. Arcus launched on July 1, 2026, and the team has been moving fast since.
What Arcus actually does
The core pitch is straightforward. Arcus lets users trade tokenized versions of U.S. stocks, think Nvidia, Tesla, Apple, and Microsoft, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, with no trading fees.
The platform currently supports over 95 tokenized U.S. equities. It runs on Robinhood Chain, a blockchain developed by Robinhood Crypto, and is accessible to users in more than 120 countries. The notable exclusions: the U.S., Canada, and the UK.
On Arcus, users hold their own assets rather than relying on a centralized intermediary to custody them. That removes a layer of counterparty risk and pulls the platform squarely into DeFi territory despite trading instruments that look very traditional.
The platform uses USDG, a stablecoin, as collateral, and it lets users margin across tokenized stocks, other real-world assets, and crypto simultaneously.
Perpetual futures enter the picture
On July 21 and 22, 2026, Arcus announced beta perpetual futures markets, adding a layer of complexity and appeal for more sophisticated traders.
Perpetual futures are derivative contracts with no expiration date. They let traders hold leveraged positions indefinitely as long as they maintain their margin. Arcus is offering up to 50x leverage on these contracts, again using USDG for margin.
The bigger picture for tokenized equities
There has also been community speculation about a potential Arcus token airdrop. No native protocol token exists currently, and the team has not made formal announcements.
The exclusion of U.S., Canadian, and UK users is not an accident. Tokenized securities remain a regulatory gray zone in those jurisdictions, and operating without registration as a securities exchange or broker-dealer carries real legal risk. Arcus is threading that needle by focusing on markets where the rules are either more permissive or less defined.