Franklin Templeton completed its acquisition of 250 Digital on June 22, establishing Franklin Crypto as an active digital asset division inside a manager overseeing approximately $1.78 trillion across more than 35 countries.
The deal, first announced April 1, transfers 250 Digital's full investment team and liquid crypto strategies to the new division. 250 Digital had spun out of CoinFund Management in January 2026, specializing in liquid token markets and blockchain infrastructure strategies. Franklin Crypto is led by Christopher Perkins as division head and Seth Ginns as chief investment officer, both formerly of 250 Digital, alongside Franklin Templeton's Tony Pecore. The division reports to Sandy Kaul, Franklin Templeton's head of innovation.
Part of the acquisition consideration was paid in BENJI tokens, tokenized shares of Franklin's OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund (FOBXX). Franklin Templeton describes FOBXX, launched in 2021, as the first U.S.-registered mutual fund to process transactions and record share ownership on a blockchain. The company says the settlement ranks among the first major financial-services acquisitions partially settled using tokenized fund shares rather than cash.
Franklin Templeton already offers passive digital asset access through spot token ETFs and tokenized money-market products. Adding Franklin Crypto shifts that positioning to active strategy management: evaluating token markets, running discretionary crypto portfolios, and building institutional mandates for pension funds and sovereign wealth funds. Franklin Templeton CEO Jenny Johnson has argued that blockchain technology creates structural pressure on traditional financial intermediaries' fee models.
For institutional allocators, the deal routes active crypto management through a $1.78 trillion manager's compliance infrastructure and distribution across 35 countries, rather than through a standalone crypto-native fund.
