Franklin Templeton closed its acquisition of 250 Digital on June 22, 2026. That close finalized the Franklin Crypto launch, the firm’s new active digital assets management division. Chris Perkins now leads the unit as Head, while Seth Ginns serves as Chief Investment Officer. Tony Pecore from Franklin Templeton Digital Assets rounds out the executive bench. Additionally, the unit reports to Sandy Kaul, Head of Innovation at Franklin Templeton. The firm announced the deal on April 1, framing it as a path to active institutional crypto strategies. Notably, that approach extends beyond passive ETF exposure.
The Operator at the Center
Perkins is the most consequential hire here. He spent 13 years at Citi as global co-head of futures, clearing, and FX prime brokerage. Then he joined CoinFund in 2021 and rose to President. He also testified before Congress on crypto market structure, helping shape the case for clear, activity-based regulation. Importantly, his profile reads less like a crypto founder and more like a derivatives infrastructure operator. That is the point. Franklin Templeton needed someone who can speak fluently to risk officers, ops teams, and pension fund compliance heads. Perkins fits that brief precisely.
On June 22, 2026, Franklin Crypto was born as @FranklnTempletn completed its acquisition of 250 Digital Asset Management. As I assume leadership of this brand new division with @sethginns and Tony Pecore–which will focus on active crypto investment strategies for institutional… pic.twitter.com/SfSCAkz6vp
— Christopher Perkins 🦅🌎⚓️NYC (@perkinscr97) June 22, 2026
BENJI as Acquisition Currency
The deal structure may matter even more than the leadership. Franklin Templeton paid for part of the acquisition using BENJI tokens. BENJI represents shares of the Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund on public blockchains. As a result, the transaction ranks among the first major financial-services M&A deals settled in tokenized fund shares. That detail is not cosmetic. It signals that tokenized money markets have crossed from a portfolio wrapper into operational corporate finance. Consequently, the same instrument used to earn yield can now move billions in deal value. Furthermore, it gives counterparties a yield-bearing alternative to dollar settlement. Franklin Templeton Digital Assets managed roughly $1.8 billion as of December 31, 2025. In other words, BENJI was already a working product before this deal. Now it is also a balance-sheet tool.
The 24/7 Problem Fiduciaries Can No Longer Ignore
Franklin Crypto’s strategic case rests on a simple observation. Markets used to close because traders needed sleep. However, blockchains never close, and neither do AI-driven execution agents. Therefore, any fiduciary running a global book faces a stark choice. They can risk-manage 24/7 alongside the crypto-native venues, or they can sit blind through weekends and holidays. The latter is increasingly hard to defend to a board. Notably, settlement risk also collapses under blockchain rails. Bankers have called this “Herstatt risk” since 1974, when Bankhaus Herstatt failed mid-day and stranded counterparties. Tokenized settlement compresses that exposure to seconds. Meanwhile, the institutions still tied to legacy windows carry the unbalanced book into Monday morning.
A Cleaner Regulatory Lane
The institutional thesis also benefits from a sharper rulebook. On May 29, 2026, the CFTC approved KalshiEX to list and clear the BTCPERP cash-settled bitcoin perpetual. That action brought perpetual futures onshore for the first time. It also opened a regulated alternative to offshore perpetual swap venues. Additionally, the Commission issued a policy statement guiding future perpetual contract submissions. The Market Participants Division also let FCMs route customers to foreign perpetuals via a no-action letter. Separately, the CLARITY Act keeps moving through Congress. The House passed the bill on July 17, 2025. Then the Senate Banking Committee advanced it 15-9 on May 14, 2026. As of June 1, the bill sits on the Senate Legislative Calendar under General Orders. Together, these moves give an institutional shop like Franklin Crypto a much shorter list of regulatory unknowns.
What Franklin Crypto Targets Next
The target client list reads exactly as you would expect. Franklin Crypto targets pensions, sovereign wealth funds, and large asset allocators. Those buyers want active strategies, not just spot exposure through a Bitcoin ETF. They want venture and structured product exposure too. They also want a single regulated counterparty wrapping all of it. Franklin Templeton already runs roughly $1.78 trillion across more than 35 countries. That global footprint hands the new unit a built-in distribution channel. Additionally, the global tokenized real-world asset market has reached roughly $26.71 billion in distributed non-stablecoin value. Tokenized U.S. Treasuries alone account for around $14.79 billion of that. Plenty of runway sits ahead for an active manager bridging regulated wrappers and on-chain liquidity. For now, Perkins says the unit is in build mode. Its four workstreams are people, clients, strategy, and controls.
*Disclaimer: News content provided by Genfinity is intended solely for informational purposes. While we strive to deliver accurate and up-to-date information, we do not offer financial or legal advice of any kind. Readers are encouraged to conduct their own research and consult with qualified professionals before making any financial or legal decisions. Genfinity disclaims any responsibility for actions taken based on the information presented in our articles. Our commitment is to share knowledge, foster discussion, and contribute to a better understanding of the topics covered in our articles. We advise our readers to exercise caution and diligence when seeking information or making decisions based on the content we provide.
