Last Updated: 16 July 2026
Alpaca builds the behind-the-scenes brokerage technology that fintechs and financial institutions use to offer trading to their customers. The company provides software connections, called APIs, that handle everything from executing trades to settling them and staying compliant with regulations. Co-founded by Yoshi Yokokawa and Hitoshi Harada, Alpaca operates as a self-clearing broker-dealer, which means it processes and settles trades entirely in-house rather than relying on outside firms.
The market around Alpaca is moving fast. The total value of tokenized stocks, which are traditional shares represented as digital tokens on a blockchain, grew more than fifty-fold in 2025, according to research from Cornell University. Regulators have started catching up, too. The U.S. SEC and CFTC issued a comprehensive interpretive release in March 2026 classifying crypto assets under existing law, and Nasdaq received approval to trade tokenized and traditional shares on the same order books. For a company that sits between traditional markets and the blockchain world, that kind of regulatory clarity is good news.
The company has raised $135 million in new financing led by Peak XV Partners, the venture capital firm formerly known as Sequoia Capital India & Southeast Asia. Elefund was a major participant, with additional backing from Opera Tech Ventures, the venture arm of BNP Paribas Group, and Unbound. Including debt financing primarily from Payward, the parent company of global digital asset platform Kraken, and BMO, the total new financing package comes to $435 million. This round follows Alpaca's $150 million Series D announced in January 2026, which valued the company at $1.15 billion.
The broader asset tokenization market covers the process of turning stocks, bonds, real estate, and other assets into digital tokens that can be traded on a blockchain. According to a June 2026 report by Citi, most industry estimates place the tokenized asset market at around $10 trillion by 2030, though forecasts range widely, from $1 trillion to tens of trillions. The basic appeal is simple. Tokenization can make trading faster and cheaper, keep markets open around the clock, and give more investors access to assets they could not previously reach.
What stands out right now is who is getting involved. BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, and JPMorgan have all launched or explored tokenized fund products. In late 2025, the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), which processes the vast majority of U.S. securities transactions, received a no-action letter from the SEC enabling it to develop tokenization services for assets it already holds. These are not experimental pilots anymore. The involvement of firms like these points to a market that needs regulated infrastructure to function at scale.
"Alpaca has built the modern infrastructure stack for global investing. Financial markets are becoming more connected and programmable every day, and that's a humongous opportunity in our view. Alpaca powers large financial institutions across the globe, and is now enabling entirely new categories like tokenization, agentic trading and on-chain infrastructure, through a single API. We're proud to lead this round as they continue to expand globally."
Aakash Kapoor, Principal at Peak XV Partners
Alpaca intends to put the new funding toward two main areas: its brokerage infrastructure for AI agents and its API-based prime brokerage platform. In practical terms, that means expanding the technology that lets financial companies, from fintechs and banks to algorithmic trading firms, build and run investing products across both traditional stock markets and blockchain-based markets through one set of tools.
The company has been expanding geographically, too. In recent months, Alpaca acquired a regulated broker-dealer in India's GIFT City, bought UK and European regulated entities, and completed licensing across all 30 countries in the European Economic Area. It has also launched European equities trading, adding to its existing coverage of U.S. stocks, ETFs, options, and crypto. The goal is to become a single access point for institutions that want to offer investing across multiple markets and asset types worldwide.
On the AI side, monthly active API users grew nearly fourfold over the past six months as Alpaca expanded capabilities for agentic AI, which refers to software agents that can autonomously execute trades and manage portfolios. The company recently launched an MCP (Model Context Protocol) server that lets users trade using natural language through AI models. That is a bet that future trading activity will increasingly be driven by AI systems acting on behalf of users, not just by human traders placing orders manually.
Alpaca was co-founded by Yoshi Yokokawa and Hitoshi Harada. Yokokawa serves as CEO. The company is headquartered in the United States and operates with a globally distributed team.
The easiest way to understand Alpaca is to think of it as plumbing. Investors interact with apps and platforms built by Alpaca's clients. But underneath those interfaces, the actual trade execution, account management, and regulatory compliance all run through Alpaca's systems. The company currently supports over 10 million brokerage accounts across hundreds of fintechs and institutions in more than 40 countries. Revenue has doubled year over year for three consecutive years, and assets under custody for stocks backing tokenized equities have surpassed $1.5 billion.
"Alpaca is uniquely positioned to become the default infrastructure layer for tokenized global capital markets and AI-native financial services. The support from our investors reflects confidence in Alpaca's execution and the market opportunity ahead. As tokenization reshapes access to global markets and AI accelerates the creation of new financial applications and market participants, demand is growing for regulated infrastructure built for this paradigm shift."
Yoshi Yokokawa, Co-Founder and CEO of Alpaca
Peak XV Partners led the $135 million raise. The firm manages over $10 billion and invests across India and Southeast Asia. Elefund also participated as a major investor. Opera Tech Ventures, the venture capital arm of French banking group BNP Paribas, and Unbound rounded out the new and returning investors. The debt portion of the $435 million total came primarily from Payward, the parent company of Kraken, and BMO.
Including this latest round, Alpaca has raised a total of $400 million in funding. The company's Series D in January 2026 raised $150 million and pushed its valuation past $1 billion, marking its entry into unicorn territory.
The investor mix tells you something about where Alpaca sits. Its backers include traditional venture capital firms, a major European bank, and crypto-native financial companies. That range mirrors the company's own business, which spans both conventional finance and the growing on-chain economy.
