Most people who hold Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) or Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) are doing one of two things with it. They’re either holding and waiting for the price to go up, or trading it for other cryptos—and ByBit just added a third option.
The crypto exchange, which serves over 80 million users and ranks among the top three globally by trading volume, launched 44 new stock CFDs on its TradFi platform. The lineup includes Apple, Amazon, BlackRock’s IBIT Bitcoin ETF, Manchester United, and sector ETFs covering energy, lithium, and uranium.
ByBit lets users hold BTC and ETH on the platform and use both as collateral to back their stock positions, so users don’t have to sell their crypto to start trading equities. If this model catches on, it turns Bitcoin and Ethereum from assets you hold and hope go up into assets you actively use—and one of the 44 stocks you can now trade with your Bitcoin is BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF itself.
44 Stock CFDs, Zero Fees, and Your Bitcoin or Ethereum as Collateral
ByBit’s TradFi platform has been adding stock CFDs since May 2025, and this latest batch of 44 brings the total to over 130. The new additions go beyond the usual tech stocks. Alongside Apple, Amazon, and AST SpaceMobile, you can now trade BlackRock’s IBIT Bitcoin ETF, Manchester United, Phillips 66, and sector ETFs focused on energy, lithium batteries, and uranium. All of them are available 24 hours a day, five days a week, with a Zero-Fee Mode where trading costs are built into the spread instead of being charged separately.
You don’t need to go out and buy stablecoins to get started, either. If you hold Bitcoin or Ethereum on ByBit, the platform’s Unified Trading Account lets you use your crypto as collateral—BTC counts at 98% of its value toward your available margin. From there, you can borrow USDT against your holdings and transfer it into TradFi to start trading stocks.
So in practice, a trader holding 1 BTC on ByBit can now use it to open positions on Apple, energy ETFs, or even BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF, without selling a single satoshi. The crypto stays in your account as collateral while you trade stocks with it.
How Crypto as Collateral Creates a New Reason to Hold BTC and ETH
Until now, most people who held Bitcoin or Ethereum on an exchange were either waiting to sell at a higher price or using it to trade other crypto. ByBit’s stock CFDs give those holdings a job to do. If your BTC is being used as collateral to back positions on Apple or energy ETFs, you’re less likely to sell it—and every Bitcoin locked up as collateral is Bitcoin that isn’t hitting the open market.
The demand looks nothing like speculation, and if more platforms adopt this model, it could seriously cut into the amount of BTC and ETH available to trade. ByBit isn’t the only exchange moving in this direction. Binance and OKX are both exploring tokenized US stocks as part of their own push into traditional markets, and Coinbase recently added commission-free stock trading to its platform.
On the traditional finance side, Morgan Stanley just launched its own Bitcoin ETF and is building crypto trading into E*Trade. So the same convergence is happening from both directions—crypto exchanges are adding stocks, and traditional brokerages are adding crypto.
For BTC and ETH holders, your crypto is no longer just a bet on price going up. It’s also becoming the foundation of a trading account that can access stocks, commodities, ETFs, and more. And if that dynamic keeps going, the demand for holding Bitcoin and Ethereum grows for reasons that have nothing to do with where the next candle prints.
Could This Change How People Think About Holding Crypto?
ByBit’s stock CFDs alone won’t move the Ethereum or Bitcoin price, but the model behind them could. Bitcoin exchange reserves have already dropped to around 2.3 million BTC in 2026 as ETFs, institutions, and long-term holders keep pulling supply off exchanges. If crypto-backed stock trading catches on and more BTC gets locked up as collateral across platforms like ByBit, Binance, and eventually others, it squeezes an already tight supply even further.
What’s happening here also goes beyond just one crypto exchange. Crypto is turning into the backbone of a multi-asset trading account, not only something you buy and hold. You could be using Bitcoin to buy BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF on ByBit or holding it in a Morgan Stanley MSBT fund. What’s crucial now is that your crypto now has more uses than it did over a year ago. And the more reasons people have to hold BTC and ETH instead of selling, the less supply there is for everyone else who wants to buy.
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