Building Your Financial Life Onchain: Phantom

Phantom just dropped its biggest product announcements in years at Breakpoint 2024, revealing a sweeping vision to transform from a crypto wallet into your complete internet-native financial account. The announcements include native prediction markets powered by Kalshi, a Stripe-backed stablecoin that just crossed $100 million market cap, and a new developer platform that could fundamentally change how users interact with decentralized applications.

Summary

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Brandon Millman, co-founder and CEO of Phantom, took the stage at Solana's fifth annual Breakpoint conference to unveil a comprehensive suite of new products designed to make Solana the backbone of consumers' financial lives. The centerpiece announcements include three major initiatives: Phantom Cash (a Stripe-integrated stablecoin and banking experience), Phantom Connect (a developer platform for embedded wallets), and native prediction market trading in partnership with Kalshi.

The timing couldn't be more significant. Phantom has been building alongside Solana for five years, watching the ecosystem evolve from underdog status to what Millman called the "undisputed biggest blockchain ecosystem in the world." These new features represent Phantom's bet that the next phase of crypto adoption will come from making blockchain-based finance feel as natural and seamless as traditional banking apps.

The announcement also signals a strategic shift in how Phantom views its role in the ecosystem. Rather than simply being a tool for storing and transacting crypto, Phantom is positioning itself as a comprehensive financial platform that can handle everything from bank transfers to sophisticated trading to prediction markets—all under the user's direct control.

What makes these announcements particularly noteworthy is the caliber of partnerships involved. Stripe, one of the world's most trusted payment processors, is powering the cash experience. Kalshi, the largest regulated prediction market in the United States, is bringing its expertise to the prediction market integration. These aren't crypto-native startups experimenting—these are established financial infrastructure players going all-in on Solana.

Key Points:

Phantom Cash: Traditional Banking Meets Blockchain

Phantom has partnered with Stripe to launch what they're calling "Cash"—a stablecoin that serves as the foundation for bringing traditional banking experiences on-chain. The Cash stablecoin has already achieved significant traction, surpassing $100 million in market cap and becoming the largest stablecoin built on Stripe's open issuance platform.

Starting this week, Phantom is rolling out Cash to users globally with features that directly mirror traditional banking: instant bank transfers, virtual accounts, and debit cards launching first in the United States. This represents a major step toward making crypto wallets functional as everyday financial accounts rather than specialized tools for trading digital assets. The integration with Stripe brings institutional-grade money movement expertise to the Solana ecosystem, potentially solving one of crypto's longest-standing challenges: the friction of moving between traditional finance and on-chain assets.

Native Prediction Markets with Kalshi Partnership

Perhaps the most surprising announcement was the integration of prediction markets directly within the Phantom wallet, launching next week. In partnership with Kalshi and Deflow, Phantom is bringing three innovations to how users engage with prediction markets.

First, users can trade prediction markets in a self-custodial, on-chain manner—meaning they maintain control of their funds throughout the process. Second, the integration includes live chat functionality, allowing traders to interact with each other in real-time, adding a social layer that Phantom believes makes prediction markets "a lot more fun when you're trading with your friends." Third, and perhaps most practically, users can trade using any Solana token—SOL, USDC, Cash, or any other token in their wallet—without needing to deposit funds into a separate system.

John Wang, Kalshi's head of crypto, emphasized that prediction markets represent a "net new asset class growing at the frontier of finance." The partnership between the largest crypto wallet and the largest prediction market aims to bring this emerging category to crypto-native users who are already comfortable with digital asset trading.

Phantom Connect: A New Developer Platform

For developers, Phantom unveiled Phantom Connect—a free developer toolkit that enables embedded wallet experiences while maintaining the safety and simplicity Phantom is known for. The platform's standout feature is "global wallets," which solves a persistent pain point in the crypto user experience.

Currently, users often end up with separate, isolated wallets for each decentralized application they use, fragmenting their funds and creating a confusing experience. With global wallets, users maintain a single Phantom account that follows them across any application on-chain. New users can onboard to apps without downloading additional software, while existing Phantom users can sign in using their existing funds and identity.

This addresses a critical barrier to mainstream adoption: the complexity of managing multiple wallets and accounts across the crypto ecosystem. By offering this as a free tool to developers, Phantom is betting that a better user experience will accelerate adoption across the entire Solana ecosystem.

Phantom Terminal: Pro-Level Trading Goes Mainstream

On the trading front, Phantom has expanded its offerings with the Phantom Terminal on web, bringing professional-grade trading tools into the same interface as users' wallets. The Terminal allows users to spot market trends early, perform automated trading strategies, and stay synchronized with mobile trading on the go.

The mobile experience has also seen significant upgrades, with Phantom claiming to have launched "the world's easiest on-the-go perps trading experience." The goal is to make sophisticated trading instruments like perpetual futures more accessible and safer for a broader audience. According to Millman, Phantom has become "one of the top places to trade perps on mobile" since launching these features.

The Flywheel Strategy for Ecosystem Growth

Millman outlined a strategic framework for how these features work together to accelerate Solana adoption. The "flywheel" approach involves continuously lowering barriers to entry for new users, providing safe and easy tools for discovery (like prediction markets), and giving developers the ability to tap into this growing user base.

This creates a self-reinforcing cycle: easier onboarding brings more users, more users attract more developers, better apps create more reasons to use Phantom, and the ecosystem grows as a result. The various product announcements—Cash for onboarding, prediction markets for engagement, and Connect for developers—are all designed to accelerate different parts of this flywheel.

Facts + Figures

• Phantom is celebrating its fifth Solana Breakpoint and approximately five years since the company's founding

• The Cash stablecoin has surpassed $100 million in market cap

• Cash is the largest stablecoin built on Stripe's open issuance platform

• Phantom Cash features (bank transfers, virtual accounts, debit cards) are rolling out starting this week, beginning with US users

• Native prediction markets will begin rolling out next week

• Phantom Connect is launching as a free developer SDK for embedded wallet experiences

• Phantom claims to be one of the top mobile platforms for perpetual futures trading

• The prediction market integration supports trading with any Solana token including SOL, USDC, Cash, and memecoins

• Kalshi is described as the largest prediction market (in the regulated US market)

• The integration includes live chat functionality for social trading

Top Quotes

"Solana has gone from underdog to undisputed biggest blockchain ecosystem in the world."

"With Solana, it's finally possible for your financial life to be internet native. That means instant, global, programmable, and under your control."

"The days of having separate, isolated wallets for each one of your apps is a thing of the past."

"Turns out prediction markets are a lot more fun when you're trading with your friends."

"Phantom is your internet native financial account on top of it all."

"Just like crypto 10 years ago, prediction markets are a net new asset class growing at the frontier of finance with supersonic speed." - John Wang, Kalshi

"Everything great that's happened in the Solana ecosystem and that will happen is because of the people in this room."

"By continuously lowering the barrier of entry for new users to get into the ecosystem, giving them a safe and easy set of tools to discover new things to do... we can all accelerate the adoption of Solana and crypto together to heights that we've never seen before."

Questions Answered

What is Phantom Cash and how does it work?

Phantom Cash is a new stablecoin-based banking experience developed in partnership with Stripe. It allows users to perform traditional banking functions—like instant bank transfers—directly from their Phantom wallet while keeping funds on-chain and under their control. The feature includes virtual accounts and debit cards for US users, essentially bridging the gap between traditional finance and crypto. The underlying stablecoin, called Cash, has already grown to over $100 million in market cap and is built on Stripe's open issuance platform, bringing institutional-grade money movement capabilities to Solana users.

How do prediction markets work within Phantom?

Starting next week, Phantom users will be able to trade prediction markets directly within their wallet through an integration with Kalshi, the largest regulated prediction market. Unlike traditional prediction market platforms that require separate deposits, Phantom's implementation allows users to trade using any Solana token already in their wallet—SOL, USDC, Cash, or memecoins. The experience is fully self-custodial, meaning users maintain control of their funds at all times. Additionally, the integration includes social features like live chat, enabling users to interact with other traders during events.

What is Phantom Connect and why should developers care?

Phantom Connect is a free developer toolkit that allows any application to embed Phantom's wallet functionality directly into their product. The key innovation is "global wallets"—instead of users having separate wallet instances for each app they use, they maintain a single Phantom identity that works across all applications. For developers, this means dramatically reduced friction for user onboarding since users don't need to download new software or create new accounts. For users, it means their funds, identity, and transaction history remain unified regardless of which Solana app they're using.

What makes Phantom's approach to trading different from other platforms?

Phantom has invested heavily in making sophisticated trading tools accessible to everyday users. On desktop, the Phantom Terminal brings professional-grade features like trend analysis and automated trading strategies into the same interface where users manage their wallet. On mobile, Phantom claims to offer "the world's easiest on-the-go perps trading experience," making complex instruments like perpetual futures accessible to users who might not have previously engaged with derivatives trading. The goal is safety and accessibility—bringing pro-level tools to a mainstream audience.

How does this announcement fit into Solana's broader ecosystem growth?

Phantom outlined a "flywheel" strategy where these features work together to accelerate Solana adoption. Lower barriers to entry (via Cash and Connect) bring new users into the ecosystem. Engaging features like prediction markets give users compelling reasons to stay active. Developer tools enable builders to create applications that tap into this growing user base. Each element reinforces the others, creating a self-sustaining growth cycle. Millman positioned Solana as "the internet's financial infrastructure" with Phantom serving as the user's primary interface to this new financial system.

Can existing Phantom users benefit from these new features immediately?

Yes, these features are designed to work seamlessly with existing Phantom accounts. Users don't need to create new wallets or migrate funds. For Phantom Cash, rollout begins this week globally with US users getting access to bank transfers, virtual accounts, and debit cards first. Prediction markets launch next week, and existing users can immediately trade using tokens already in their wallet. Phantom Connect's global wallet feature means existing Phantom users can sign into new applications using their current account and funds without any additional setup.