The Boss of Franklin Templeton Reveals the Truth about Wall Street's Fear of Crypto

The CEO of Franklin Templeton has just broken a taboo. In front of the industry gathered in Paris at the Proof of Talk summit, Jenny Johnson said what few players of her stature dare to state: crypto and blockchain directly threaten the profits of large financial institutions. It is not a decentralized startup claiming this. It is the leader of an asset manager weighing 1.74 trillion dollars.

Why does crypto threaten Wall Street’s economic model?

During a panel at the Proof of Talk summit in Paris, Jenny Johnson straightforwardly identified the reason for the blockage. According to Franklin Templeton’s CEO, the blockchain technology calls into question a significant number of economic models in traditional finance.

The fact is that the crypto blockchain allows instant settlement via smart contracts. Result: big banks will no longer be able to collect transaction fees by playing the role of intermediaries. This is the core of the problem.

Benji, Stellar and MoonPay: concrete proof of the crypto shift

Franklin Templeton does not only present theoretical arguments. The group already operates Benji, a tokenized money market fund running notably on the Stellar blockchain. The figures presented by Jenny Johnson can only attract the attention of the crypto community:

• $1.30 per transaction on the traditional infrastructure;
• $1.13 per transaction on Stellar;
• comparison made over 50,000 transactions.

Sure, the gap seems modest at first glance. However, at a large scale, it can generate significant savings. Applied to billions of transactions, it represents a massive destruction of revenues for traditional players.

That’s not all! The group also announced a partnership with MoonPay. The goal: to facilitate exchanges between stablecoins and tokenized funds in an onchain environment.

Will crypto really replace banks?

Despite her support for blockchain, Jenny Johnson does not foresee the disappearance of financial institutions. Facing Blockstream CEO Adam Back during her intervention, she reminded that the majority of investors still seek trusted players for the custody of their assets. Custody services, regulatory compliance, and KYC controls should therefore retain an important place.

According to Johnson, the transformation seems rather to take the form of a hybrid model. Crypto blockchain could reduce costs and accelerate settlements, while financial institutions would continue to ensure security and the regulatory framework. An evolution that could sustainably reshape the future of crypto and global finance.

One thing is certain: the year 2026 marks the tipping point where crypto infrastructures are no longer a technological option, but an economic survival necessity for global finance. Some even already announce the end of the separation between banks and crypto assets.