Franklin Templeton has agreed to acquire 250 Digital, an active cryptocurrency investment manager formed from the liquid strategies arm of CoinFund Management, the firm announced Tuesday . The deal will fold 250 Digital's team and all of its liquid crypto strategies into a newly created unit called Franklin Crypto.
CoinFund veterans Christopher Perkins and Seth Ginns will lead the new division alongside Franklin Templeton Digital Assets managing director Tony Pecore. Perkins, who will head Franklin Crypto, called crypto's "institutional moment" a core rationale for the deal. Ginns will serve as CIO.
Franklin Crypto will report to Sandy Kaul, Franklin Templeton's head of innovation, and will expand on the firm's existing digital assets platform — which manages approximately $1.8 billion — with a focus on serving institutional clients through active management of liquid crypto.
The deal is expected to close in Q2 2026, pending definitive agreements and client consents. The financial terms were not disclosed, but the payment structure is notable: Franklin Templeton said a portion of the consideration will be paid in BENJI tokens, the shares of its Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund (FOBXX) , which launched in 2021 as the first U.S.-registered mutual fund to record share ownership on a blockchain. The firm said the arrangement represents "an important and innovative step toward conducting M&A transactions on chain."
The acquisition marks the latest move by a major traditional asset manager to deepen its crypto exposure as institutional appetite grows. Franklin Templeton has been building its digital assets infrastructure since 2018, encompassing tokenomics research, blockchain node operation, and venture capital investments. Buying 250 Digital gives it what it previously lacked: a dedicated, actively managed liquid crypto product suite with a crypto-native investment team at the helm.
