Last week, on July 2, Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev said in an interview with CNBC that memecoins essentially lead the market to a dead end. According to him, assets without practical use create no value, and issuing hundreds of such tokens is pointless. Tenev added that the future of the crypto industry is tied to the tokenization of real-world assets (RWA) and moving them onto the blockchain.
However, today he wrote on X:
‘While we are building Robinhood Chain as the best network for RWA… it is also great for memes.’
At first glance, this looks like a contradiction. But in reality, this is exactly the company’s intended approach.
On July 1, Robinhood officially launched the public mainnet of Robinhood Chain. The presentation took place during a London broadcast called ‘The World is Flat.’
Robinhood Chain is built on Arbitrum Orbit as a Layer 2 network. It operates permissionlessly and was primarily created for the tokenization of real-world assets and the development of on-chain finance.
See Also: The SEC Is Preparing Its First Formal Crypto Rule. Atkins Has Two Deadlines
The key product of the network is Stock Tokens — tokenized debt instruments that track the value of companies like NVDA and AAPL. They can be traded 24/7 in more than 120 countries.
The New Network Needs Users First, Then Big Ideas
No matter how convincing the blockchain development plan looks, a concept alone is not enough. From the first days, the network needs users, activity, and liquidity. Tokenized stocks, despite all their potential, cannot attract an audience as quickly as memecoins can.
The first major memecoin in the Robinhood Chain ecosystem was CASHCAT. On July 8, its price rose by 718% in a single day, and its market capitalization reached $68 million. This surge quickly attracted traders to the network, which at that point had been operating for less than a week.
CASHCAT also has its own story. When Robinhood was just launching as a stock trading app in the U.S., a cat named Cash Cat was its mascot. Thanks to this, the token gained a brand connection that most new memecoins usually lack. It seems that a unique memetoken ecosystem is already starting to form around Robinhood Chain.
Memecoins in the Robinhood Chain ecosystem. Source: Dexscreener
Essentially, Tenev’s tweet did not mean abandoning the RWA idea. Rather, he was simply calling the first wave of users to the network.
Robinhood Follows the Path of Base
When Base was just launching, it was positioned as a Layer 2 network focused on regulatory compliance and institutional use. However, its real popularity came not from corporate solutions but from memecoins and social apps. Speculative activity is what brought users and liquidity to the network while the infrastructure gradually developed. It seems that Robinhood decided to take the same path.
The company’s intentions are also clear from its zero gas fee program for the first 90 days. Starting July 1, Robinhood is covering all transaction fees for operations through its wallet, including token swaps and perpetual futures trading.
See Also: The Most Profitable Deal of the Week Was Morning Coffee, Not Crypto
Free fees are one of the simplest ways to attract users to a new network. For Robinhood, this is more of a customer acquisition expense than a temporary act of generosity.
In addition, on launch day, Robinhood Chain was integrated with Uniswap and Chainlink. Thanks to this, the basic infrastructure was ready almost immediately, and the main task became attracting as many active users to the network as possible.
So Far, the Numbers Tell a Different Story
Despite high interest in the launch, Robinhood Chain remains a relatively small network for now. According to DeFiLlama, as of July 8, the total value locked (TVL) was about $100 million.
For a project developed under the Robinhood brand and with potential access to nearly 28 million users in 38 countries, this is still a rather modest figure.
TVL Robinhood Chain. Source: DeFiLlama
The timing of the launch was also no accident. Shortly before, Robinhood cut about 10% of its staff, so it is important for the company to quickly show that the new network is truly attracting users.
This is exactly where memecoins come into play. They create the first transactions, bring in new users, and form liquidity. The higher the activity in the network, the easier it is to develop further and launch more serious products.
In the long term, Robinhood is betting not on memecoins, but on tokenized stocks and other real-world assets. However, the company first needs to prove that the infrastructure itself is in demand and can operate at scale, and then wait for clearer rules from regulators.
That’s why Tenev’s words do not contradict each other. By criticizing memecoins, he was not abandoning the idea of developing Robinhood Chain around RWA. Rather, he showed that memetokens can be a tool to attract the first users, and then pave the way to the core product.
