Schwab Adds SOL, AVAX and LINK to Crypto Platform
Charles Schwab is bringing Solana, Avalanche and Chainlink to its $13T brokerage. Why the token selection matters more than the fee for altcoins.
A latecomer moves
Charles Schwab, the brokerage sitting on $13 trillion in client assets, will let customers trade Solana, Avalanche and Chainlink alongside Bitcoin and Ether in the coming months. The firm confirmed the expansion on August 27.
Schwab is late to this. It only switched on direct BTC and ETH trading in May 2026, long after Coinbase, Robinhood and Kraken had locked up the retail crowd. SOL, AVAX and LINK mark its first expansion. The stated rationale: client demand for established, liquid assets. Meme coins need not apply.
The fee is the catch
Schwab charges 75 basis points on the dollar value of every crypto trade. That undercuts nobody: Morgan Stanley and Fidelity have been racing to the bottom on pricing, and Schwab is content to sit above them. Clients are paying for the convenience of holding crypto inside the same account as their equities and bonds.
Selection over size
The fee matters less than the filter. A custodian this size does not list tokens whose regulatory standing is shaky. By waving through Solana, Avalanche and Chainlink, Schwab effectively stamps them institution-grade and pushes the rest of the altcoin field one rung down.
For Solana, this is another link in an adoption chain running through ETF filings and now brokerage access. Chainlink rides its position as the oracle layer banks tap for tokenization. Avalanche is the soft spot in the trio: weaker fundamentals, but now spoken of in the same breath as the two stronger names.
What it means for the tape
Don't expect fireworks on the chart. The rollout stretches across months with no firm dates, so the near-term price impact stays muted. The real lever is the capital Schwab clients could not easily route into crypto because leaving the familiar account felt like friction. That friction is gone. Over weeks, not days, it tilts the SOL and LINK holder base toward buy-and-hold: structural support that shows up slowly.