Robinhood plans to build Layer2 on Arbitrum: A new attempt at the fusion of TradFi and Blockchain

Robinhood is planning to build a Layer2 solution on Arbitrum, which has attracted widespread attention in the industry. From a technical perspective, Robinhood's choice of Arbitrum's Nitro tech stack is similar to Coinbase's previous selection of the Optimism OP Stack tech stack. However, the success of Base has already proven that the advantages of a tech stack do not equate to the success of the parent chain.

Robinhood's development on Arbitrum may benefit from its brand effect, compliance resources, and user base. In the short term, this may not directly reflect in the price of the ARB token, but in the long run, if Robinhood successfully implements "U.S. stocks on the chain," it could open up an unprecedented path for large-scale applications within the Ethereum ecosystem.

Unlike the generic Layer2 solutions of Coinbase, Robinhood may move towards a specialized Layer2 approach, customizing a suitable on-chain infrastructure specifically for bringing TradFi on-chain. Considering features such as T+0 settlement for stocks, real-time risk control, and compliance requirements, Robinhood's new Layer2 may require deep customization at the virtual machine level, consensus mechanism, and data structure to fully leverage the potential of Layer2 scaling solutions.

Arbitrum's technical solution is indeed more mature than Optimism in certain aspects. Nitro's WASM architecture has higher execution efficiency and has a natural advantage in handling complex financial calculations. Stylus supports multi-language development of high-performance contracts and can handle some heavy computational tasks of TradFi. BoLD solves the problem of malicious delay attacks, enhancing the security of optimistic verification. Orbit supports customized Layer3 deployments, providing enough flexibility to develop features. These technical advantages are likely key reasons why Arbitrum was chosen, as they align with the strict "customization" requirements of TradFi for infrastructure.

The challenges faced by US stock on-chain and coin stock exchanges far exceed those in the traditional cryptocurrency space. They will serve users who are familiar with traditional financial products, accustomed to millisecond-level response times, 24/7 service, and T+0 seamless settlement experiences. More importantly, there may be institutional funds, algorithmic trading, and high-frequency strategies involved, which place extremely high demands on system stability and performance. This means that Robinhood's Layer2 solution will face unprecedented challenges.

Overall, Robinhood's layout of Layer2 is significant. This is not just a new player added to the Layer2 tech stack, but a crucial experiment to validate whether the cryptocurrency infrastructure can support the core business of the modern financial system. If the experiment succeeds, it could accelerate the digital reconstruction process of the entire trillion-dollar traditional financial markets, including bonds, futures, insurance, and real estate. In the long run, this will directly benefit the application scenario landing of the entire Ethereum L1+L2 ecosystem and may redefine the value capture logic of Layer2.