Reversing the Crypto Deposit Runoff
By Laurie McLachlan, Chief Marketing Officer at Revio Insight
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Need to Know:
- The crypto market now totals $3.1 trillion.
- 18-20% of U.S. adults report owning or using crypto. Among men under 50, ownership rises to roughly one in four.
- Nearly three-quarters of U.S. consumers would try stablecoins if offered by their bank.
- 75% of consumers trust banks more than fintechs or exchanges to manage digital assets safely.
Ignore recent volatility: The digital-asset market is no longer a sideshow. It is a growing gravitational force quietly pulling deposits, payments, and customer relationships out of the traditional banking system.
Every week, funds that once stayed within FDIC-insured institutions are being rerouted into digital assets and stablecoins. What began as a niche experiment is now a market worth more than $3.1 trillion, moving money at unprecedented speed and redefining how consumers and businesses manage value.
Picture this: A customer deposits their paycheck on Friday. By Saturday, part of it is gone, moved to Coinbase with just a few taps. On Monday, another uses PayPal to quietly buy Ethereum. These are not isolated cases. They happen across the country every day, often without the bank or credit union even realizing it.
“Banks are facing a ‘milkshake problem’,” says Nick Elledge, Cofounder & COO of Stablecore. “This growing pool of digital assets and stablecoins is sucking deposits directly from the $17 trillion US deposit base, disintermediating customer relationships and redefining payment rails. With stablecoins alone growing to over $3 trillion in supply by 2030, banks and credit unions need to act now.”
Do you know how much money left your bank last month, and where it went? Consider:
- A small community bank watched millions disappear overnight when a single multimillion-dollar wire left for Coinbase.
- A larger regional bank discovered that more than 40 percent of its customers already held crypto elsewhere, overturning assumptions about its demographics.
- A top-20 U.S. bank tracked roughly $200 million per month moving back and forth with Coinbase — about $2.4 billion annually.
Each of these stories illustrates the same truth: crypto outflows are already happening at scale. Nor is crypto ownership a fringe behavior. It has become a normal part of personal and business finance across all demographics.
Recent national surveys show that about one in five U.S. adults now hold digital assets. What was once limited to early adopters has entered the mainstream.
- Crypto adoption: 18-20% of U.S. adults report owning or using crypto.¹
- Market scale: Global crypto market cap ≈ $3.35 trillion.²
- Dominance: Bitcoin ≈ 59%; Ethereum ≈ 12%.²
- Stablecoins: Aggregate market cap ≈ $310 billion (about 8–9 percent of total).²
Why It Matters Even customers who appear conservative may already participate in digital assets. These transactions are usually invisible inside a bank’s data. Each transfer to an exchange represents not just a loss of liquidity but a loss of visibility and influence. Once funds and habits migrate elsewhere, they rarely return.
The Big Banks Already Have a Plan
The largest banks have accepted that digital assets are here to stay. Rather than resist the trend, they are finding ways to integrate it within their ecosystems. When customers can buy, hold, or redeem crypto through their primary bank, deposits remain in the system.
The FIS Report, Banks Hold the Key to Stablecoin Adoption, found that nearly 75 percent of U.S. consumers would try stablecoins if offered by their bank. The good news? FIS also found that the same proportion of consumers still trust banks more than fintechs or exchanges to manage digital assets safely. That gap highlights the trust advantage banks still hold and the urgency of moving from simply observing crypto outflows to offering secure, compliant options that keep customers in the relationship.
- Chase and Coinbase: Chase enables credit-card funding to Coinbase and plans to let users convert Ultimate Rewards points to crypto.³
- Merrill and Wells Fargo: Offering spot Bitcoin ETFs to select wealth clients, framing them as another investment class.⁴
- U.S. Bank: Reactivated Bitcoin custody for institutional managers to keep digital value on its balance sheet.⁵
Megabanks are reframing crypto as a mainstream service line instead of an external threat. By owning the access point, they are protecting liquidity and reinforcing primacy. Regional and community institutions should do the same to compete effectively.
Your Biggest Competitors Are Apps, Not Banks
Your competition is no longer limited to banks. It is the app a customer downloads in under a minute. Coinbase, Kraken, PayPal, Revolut, Robinhood, and Cash App have made it easier to fund crypto than to open a certificate of deposit. These platforms do not need to win the entire relationship. They only need a slice.
Who are the leading players?
- Coinbase – Largest U.S. platform with over 100 million users and a dominant exchange share.
- Robinhood Crypto – App-first and popular with younger investors who trade frequently.
- PayPal and Venmo – Mainstream payment apps with integrated crypto access for hundreds of millions of users.
- Cash App (Block) – 55 million users with a heavy focus on Bitcoin funding.
- Kraken and Gemini – Security- and compliance-oriented platforms favored by long-term holders.
- Crypto.com and Binance.US – Aggressive marketing and wide token lists attracting retail traders.
- SoFi, Revolut, and Fidelity Digital Assets – Institutions blending banking, investing, and crypto in a single experience.
Five Moves That Keep Bank Deposits in Play
Each time your customer funds a crypto wallet or earns rewards in digital assets, that money exits the traditional banking ecosystem. The longer these flows go untracked, the harder it becomes to recover lost relationships.
You do not need to become an exchange to compete. You only need to meet customers where they already are while maintaining safety, trust, and regulatory clarity. The following five capabilities define a practical response for any institution.
1. Develop Digital-Asset Accounts
Through a provider like Stablecore, offer integrated digital-asset accounts or wallets that let customers see and manage their holdings without leaving your ecosystem.
2. Enable Stablecoin Send and Receive
Support tokenized payments and cross-border transactions that lower costs and keep balances within your network.
3. Expand into Digital-Asset Lending and Credit
Allow qualified customers to borrow against digital holdings, combining traditional underwriting discipline with modern assets.
4. Use Crypto Rewards to Engage Younger Audiences
Offer crypto- or stablecoin-based rewards to attract younger customers who value digital incentives over cash back or points.
5. Track Deposit Outflows to Digital Platforms
Use analytics to identify which customers are funding crypto or stablecoin accounts. Knowing who is moving money out is the first step to defending and rebuilding primacy.
These capabilities do not require speculative risk. They require visibility, intent, and a willingness to modernize how relationships are measured and protected.
“Visibility is the starting point for every digital-asset strategy,” says Brian Bauer, CEO of Revio Insight. “If you cannot see in your core transactions how much is leaving for crypto providers, you cannot build a plan to defend or grow. The institutions that measure these outflows today will be the ones that win more of the relationship tomorrow.”
Every Month You Wait, More Money Leaves
Crypto will not destroy traditional banking overnight. The risk is slower and more persistent. A $500 Venmo-to-Bitcoin transfer here, a $5,000 Coinbase wire there. Over time, these small leaks add up to billions in lost deposits.
As customers grow accustomed to moving value across platforms, loyalty weakens. The institutions that wait for clearer signals will find that migration has already happened.
Every month without a response is another month of silent attrition. The choice is not whether to participate in the digital-asset economy. It is whether to participate intentionally or by default.
Seeing the Outflow Is Step One
Crypto is now part of the financial mainstream. The question is not whether it matters but how you will respond.
- Start with visibility. Know who is moving money out and why.
- Build a strategy. Decide if you will compete through access, partnership, or both.
- Equip your teams. Give bankers and relationship managers the intelligence to act, not just react.
- Lead with trust. Customers already trust you with their deposits. They will trust you with innovation if you move first.
The institutions that take deliberate action now will capture loyalty and deposits in the next era of banking. Those that do not will watch the quiet drain become a permanent gap.
“Banks can no longer afford to treat digital assets as someone else’s problem,” argues Carey Ransom, Managing Director at BankTech Ventures. “The first step is visibility, understanding how much value is leaving for crypto providers and why. The next step is strategy, finding the right partners and capabilities to participate in this shift instead of just defending against it. The banks that move now will shape how this market evolves.”
The Path Forward: From Visibility To Strategy
Crypto has become a core part of the financial ecosystem, whether banks engage with it or not. The first step toward competing in this environment is understanding the scale of outflows and where they are going. Visibility allows leaders to turn unknown risks into known opportunities.
With that clarity, institutions can move from reacting to designing. They can identify which segments are most affected, develop products that meet those needs, and rebuild primacy before new habits harden elsewhere.
From Bitcoin to Full-Blown Ecosystem
| Asset | Share of Global Crypto Market Cap |
|---|---|
| Bitcoin (BTC) | ~59 % |
| Ethereum (ETH) | ~12 % |
| Tether (USDT) | ~6 % |
| Other stablecoins (USDC, DAI, FDUSD, etc.) | ~2 % |
| Remaining assets: | ~21 % |
| Global crypto market cap: | ≈ $3.1 trillion |
| Stablecoins (total): | ≈ $310 billion (about 8–9 % of total) |
(Source: CoinMarketCap, November 2025)
Crypto began with Bitcoin but has consolidated around a few dominant assets.
Together, Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Tether now account for nearly three-quarters of the entire crypto market value. That concentration matters: when customers move money out of deposits, the majority is flowing into just a handful of destinations.
