For fintech developers, the hardest part of building a trading app isn't the user interface. It's the regulated plumbing underneath: the broker-dealer license, the clearing and settlement systems, the custody of assets. Alpaca, a San Mateo-based startup, has spent seven years turning that plumbing into a set of developer APIs. The result is a business that now sits beneath more than 9 million brokerage accounts globally, quietly processing trades for hundreds of partners who would rather not navigate FINRA on their own [CB Insights, October 2025] [YesPress, retrieved 2026].
The bet on brokerage-as-a-service
Alpaca's core proposition is that financial services can be embedded, piece by piece, into any application. It operates as a self-clearing broker-dealer, providing a regulated foundation upon which other companies can build. Through its APIs, partners can offer their end-users the ability to trade U.S. stocks, ETFs, options, and cryptocurrencies, all without obtaining their own broker-dealer license [Y Combinator, retrieved 2026] [Alpaca, retrieved 2026]. This brokerage-as-a-service model turns a multi-year, capital-intensive regulatory hurdle into a software integration, a wedge that has attracted a developer community of over 61,000 monthly active users [Alpaca, retrieved 2026].
Dominance in a nascent asset class
The company's most striking traction is in tokenized equities, a frontier where traditional finance meets blockchain infrastructure. Here, Alpaca isn't just a participant; it is the market. The company holds a 94% share of the tokenized US stock and ETF market, with over $670 million in tokenized assets under custody as of January 2026 [BusinessWire, December 2025] [YouTube, retrieved 2026]. For large and mega-cap stocks, that share rises to 97% [BusinessWire, December 2025]. This dominance stems from its Instant Tokenization Network, a service that allows partners to issue blockchain-based representations of real securities.
The financial metrics backing this growth are substantial. Alpaca has reported annual recurring revenue surpassing $100 million, with revenue doubling year-over-year for three consecutive years [Ventureburn, retrieved 2026] [cryptorank.io, retrieved 2026]. This growth fueled a $150 million Series D round in January 2026, led by Drive Capital, which valued the company at $1.15 billion and brought a $40 million line of credit [Fortune, January 2026] [Alpaca, retrieved 2026].
The founders and the fintech flywheel
Co-founders Yoshi Yokokawa and Hitoshi Harada bring complementary backgrounds to the highly regulated world they are building in. Yokokawa, the CEO, is a former trader whose career began at Lehman Brothers and included roles at Nomura before he founded and sold a deep-learning software company [TechCrunch, November 2019] [The Org, retrieved 2026]. Harada, the technologist, has a background in database and infrastructure engineering [TechCrunch, April 2025].
Their strategy extends beyond basic trading. Alpaca's API suite now includes specialized offerings that cater to global and niche markets, which function as additional wedges: Shariah-compliant investing, 24/5 trading, and high-yield cash & securities lending [LinkedIn, retrieved 2026]. These features help Alpaca's partners, which range from neobanks and fintech apps to crypto exchanges like Kraken, differentiate their own offerings without building the underlying capability [CoinDesk, retrieved 2026].
The regulatory and execution tightrope
The risks for Alpaca are the inverse of its advantages. Its entire business is built on a foundation of regulatory permissions and operational excellence. A significant compliance failure, a trading outage, or a shift in regulatory stance on tokenization could directly impact every one of its hundreds of partners. Furthermore, while it has first-mover advantage in tokenization, the space is attracting attention from larger financial institutions and competing infrastructure providers.
The company's answer appears to be depth and trust. It emphasizes its status as a member of FINRA and SIPC, and its execution broker partners include established firms like Citadel Securities and Virtu [Alpaca, retrieved 2026]. The recent board addition of Chris Olsen, co-founder of lead investor Drive Capital, suggests a focus on scaling governance alongside growth [Fortune, January 2026].
What the next year holds
For the millions of end-users whose brokerage accounts are powered by Alpaca's infrastructure, the standard of care is defined by reliability, cost, and access. Alpaca's model proposes a new standard: programmable, global, and modular. The company has outlined plans to expand its product lineup to include non-U.S. equities like European and Asian stocks, and to fully support 24/5 trading of U.S. equities [TechCrunch, April 2025]. Success in these expansions would move Alpaca from being a facilitator of U.S. market access to a truly global financial infrastructure layer.