CEO wants Coinbase regulated as a CIRO dealer by early 2027
Coinbase plans to start moving Canadian customers beyond spot crypto trading within weeks, the first concrete step in a push to turn its app into a single account holding crypto, cash, and stocks.
Eric Richmond, country director and CEO of Coinbase Canada, told BNN Bloomberg the priority is bringing what the company calls the "Everything Exchange" to Canada, extending the platform past digital-asset trading.
Richmond framed the move as a second act north of the border.
The company's early years were "chapter one" as a crypto exchange, he said, and the next stage folds a customer's "entire financial experience" into one always-on app.
The nearest step is derivatives.
Speaking to Crypto Citizens Network at the Blockchain Futurist Conference in Toronto, Richmond said Coinbase Financial Markets, the company's US Commodity Futures Trading Commission-regulated arm, had secured an international exemption to offer contracts to Canadian permitted clients.
"That product is actually going live very shortly, in the next few weeks," he told CCN.
The rollout would take the platform, which Richmond said currently lists more than 200 crypto assets on the spot market, beyond simple buying and selling, though the first version would reach permitted clients rather than every retail customer.
Regulatory positioning sits at the centre of the plan.
Coinbase became the first international crypto exchange to register as a restricted dealer in Canada, and Richmond said he now wants membership under the country's investment-industry regulator.
"My focus is actually to get Coinbase regulated as a CIRO dealer as well, which we expect to happen in early 2027," he told CCN, referring to the Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization.
Richmond, who became CEO in June, previously served as general counsel and head of business development at Shakepay and co-founded Tetra Trust, according to the Globe and Mail.
Tokenized stocks are the other near-term product.
Coinbase plans to release them for non-US customers this month, the company said, putting share ownership on the blockchain with dividend payouts and shareholder rights attached.
The firm is building products that "basically look and act and feel like traditional equity," Richmond told BNN Bloomberg.
Tokenized shares would open certain stocks to more investors and shift collateral management, he said.
The shares "can come through a dealer or a broker rather than being tokenized through the issuer itself," meaning issuers would not have to create them.
At the Toronto conference he pointed to South Korea-listed Samsung as a foreign stock that is hard for an ordinary Canadian to buy directly, per CCN.
On stablecoins, the platform mainly supports USD Coin, a US token pegged one-to-one to the US dollar, and does not list a major Canadian dollar equivalent because no domestic token has met regulators' listing standards, BNN Bloomberg reported.
Richmond linked the gap to pending legislation.
The Stablecoin Act is meant to "regulate stablecoins as payments, not as investments," he said, giving users confidence in a Canadian dollar stablecoin.
Stablecoin volume hit US$1.8tn in June, Richmond said, up 125 percent year over year.
Richmond also said Coinbase holds a Canadian Securities Administrators exemption to pay rewards in digital assets, offering customers roughly 3 percent on USDC, and he wants that protected under the incoming rules.
He backed the Bank of Canada to supervise stablecoins, pointing to its central bank digital currency research.
Richmond told CCN it is "definitely the right regulator," while allowing for open questions. There would be "things that they need to learn on the way," he said.
He expects detailed rules in the second half of 2026, with a framework in force in early 2027.
The expansion would push Coinbase closer to conventional brokerages such as Robinhood.
Richmond said there is room for several players as Canadians look for alternatives.
Richmond told BNN Bloomberg that "a rising tide lifts all boats," then pointed to the friction in legacy finance.
Markets and banks "close at 4pm," wires "can take days to settle," and access to certain products stays "gated" for high-net-worth clients, he said.
Over the next year, Richmond said, he wants to give Canadians more product choice in one place.
