Robinhood Chain Posts a Week One No One Saw Coming—Memecoins Included 🐸

Robinhood Chain, the Arbitrum-based layer-2 network launched on July 1, has recorded more than $70 million in Ether bridged to the network during its first week, according to Token Terminal data cited on Thursday. The EVM-compatible chain uses ETH as its native gas token, and Robinhood has described it as "AI-native and purpose-built for real-world assets." Token Terminal said on X that "Robinhood Chain is rapidly turning liquidity into economic activity," noting that daily active users reached 194,000 and daily revenue climbed to $39,000, implying a $14 million annualized revenue run rate within seven days of launch.

DefiLlama figures show Robinhood Chain holding 46,748 ETH in total value locked, worth approximately $83 million at current prices, with 31,855 ETH—around $55 million—bridged on Thursday alone. Robinhood crypto general manager Johann Kerbrat put first-week totals at more than 17 million transactions, nearly 350,000 addresses, roughly $250 million in protocol TVL, and over $1 billion in DEX volume. The chain processed $568 million in trading volume on Wednesday and topped $350 million more by Thursday, logging over 5.2 million transactions and 213,000 active addresses across the two days, and its 24-hour DEX volume of around $433 million now ranks fifth among all blockchains on DefiLlama, ahead of Hyperliquid. Total value locked rose more than 7,000,000% over the week off a near-zero base to roughly $94 million, with stablecoin balances climbing past $260 million.

CEO Vlad Tenev reposted the figures on X on July 9, writing: "Robinhood Summer is here ☀️." Uniswap founder Hayden Adams said Friday that most activity on Robinhood Chain is ETH-denominated, calling ETH "the base pair for trading, the highest volume asset, and the gas token to pay for blockspace," and adding that the chain "also burns ETH on L1 to pay data storage fees." Arbitrum's ARB token jumped 20% to lead the top 100, as Robinhood Chain routes 10% of its net protocol revenue back to the Arbitrum ecosystem. On-chain activity has been fueled in part by memecoins, with tokens such as Cash Cat reaching a $180 million-plus market cap and Robinhood-themed coins including Dog In Hood, Hoodrat, and Robinhood Summer posting gains in the hundreds and thousands of percent; one trader turned $800 into more than $1 million and another turned $85 into $2 million.

Andri Fauzan Adziima, research lead at Bitrue Research Institute, said the early volume "validates the L2 flywheel" and called it "a meaningful new demand sink," adding that "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." Tim Sun, senior researcher at HashKey Group, described it as "a clear, structural positive for ETH," noting that "for Ethereum, the most direct benefit is that Robinhood Chain uses ETH for gas" and that "as bridged assets, wallet addresses, and on-chain transactions grow, new demand for ETH is generated." Sun added that 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," further solidifying the Ethereum mainnet's position as the settlement layer for tokenized assets.

Ethereum and its layer-2 networks hold more than 50% market share in tokenized real-world assets, according to RWA.xyz, and Robinhood already offers tokenized stocks to customers in more than 120 countries. Token Terminal said that "if adoption continues, the chain could become a meaningful new source of demand for ETH," framing Robinhood Chain's first week as a measurable lift for ETH-denominated activity across the Ethereum stack.