Franklin Templeton says Wall Street fears blockchain because it threatens its profits
Franklin Templeton CEO Jenny Johnson argues that traditional financial institutions are hesitant to adopt public blockchain technology because it threatens their lucrative fee-based business models. She highlights that tokenized funds, like their Benji platform, offer significantly lower costs than legacy systems, signaling a structural shift in asset management.
Why it matters
This highlights the growing tension between traditional financial incumbents and decentralized finance, suggesting a potential industry-wide disruption of transaction-based revenue models.
Share Share this article Copy link X icon X (Twitter) LinkedIn Facebook Email Franklin Templeton says Wall Street fears blockchain because it threatens its profits Jenny Johnson, Franklin Templeton s CEO, said blockchain and crypto threaten a huge number of business models that exist today in traditional finance. By Olivier Acuna | Edited by Omkar Godbole Jun 3, 2026, 7:04 a.m. 2 min read Make preferred on Blockstream s Adam Back and Franklin Templeton s Jenny Johnson participated in a Proof of Talk panel in Paris 2026. (Olivier Acuna/CoinDesk) What to know : Franklin Templeton CEO Jenny Johnson said major financial firms are slow to adopt public blockchains because the technology threatens lucrative fee-based business models built on intermediating transactions. Johnson cited the firm’s tokenized money market fund, Benji, to argue that running transactions on public networks like Stellar is dramatically cheaper than legacy systems and is driving traditional players on-chain. While acknowledging that bitcoin enables self-custody and privacy, Johnson maintained that most investors will still want regulated custodians and standardized, low-cost compliance rails as institutional wealth moves into digital assets. The future of asset management is shifting on-chain, but the transition is exposing a major structural conflict over traditional corporate revenue.
The article reports on a CEO's perspective on industry trends without taking a stance, though it focuses on a pro-crypto viewpoint.
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