Why Crypto Platforms Want To Become Your Everyday Money App

What Happened

“I check my banking app all the time,” ChangeNOW’s director of strategic partnerships said during an interview at TOKEN2049 in Singapore.

Market Context

Crypto platforms want a similar place in their customers’ lives. The “super app” model puts trading alongside services such as payments and borrowing, giving people reasons to return between transactions. Whether those services become a habit is a harder question.

Kaiko’s 2026 research describes exchanges expanding into broader financial platforms, connecting trading balances to yield products and spending services. Keeping those activities together gives platforms more opportunities to retain customers and their funds.

Why It Matters

Asked whether crypto has enough demand for super apps, Masser started with the limits of swapping tokens. Some traders transact constantly. Others might make a swap every few days, or once a week.

A super app can provide all sorts of financial resources and activities. But does it need one dominant, recurring use-case? Masser argued that different customers could build different routines around the same product.

A customer checking a balance may have little interest in borrowing. An active trader may care more about swap fees. Masser also pointed to AML wallet checks for money-laundering exposure among ChangeNOW Pro’s features.

He recalled his own experience of buying crypto on one platform, then moving elsewhere to swap it. Bringing those steps together could also help customers discover services as their needs develop.

That creates a design problem. The host asked how platforms could keep adding functions without overwhelming the interface.

He used ordering McDonald’s through a crypto app as an example of a feature that could feel out of place. His test was whether services fit together and allow people to move naturally from one task to the next.

Details

Martin Masser opens his banking app even when he has nothing to pay. Sometimes, he just wants to check his balance.

What Brings You Back When You Have Nothing to Trade?

He described checking earnings and reviewing previous transactions as reasons to open an app without making another trade. His comparison was with banking, where customers routinely look at their money without moving it.

“The more use cases that you get, the more you start using,” he said.

Masser offered examples of that behavior, though the interview included no retention figures showing how widely it has taken hold at ChangeNOW.

Does Everyone Need the Same Reason to Return?

“People use the apps in very different ways,” he said. Drawing on his earlier work in banking product development, he added: “We aren’t the user.”

His argument leaves room for occasional users. An app can become useful across someone’s financial life without demanding the attention of a messaging service.

Why Does Moving Money Still Take Several Apps?

For some users, the appeal is more immediate. They receive USDT on one blockchain and need it on another.

Masser described that as a recurring problem in conversations with customers. A transaction that looks simple to the recipient can require unfamiliar steps between networks.

“It’s much easier to have it in one place,” he said.

This is the practical case for a broader app: fewer separate processes to complete one financial task. Adding more services helps only if moving between them becomes easier.

When Does a Super App Become a Cluttered App?

“There’s no point adding something that doesn’t make sense for the product,” Masser said.