A significant change is underway as Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan are set to participate in a crypto conference not only as speakers but also as sponsors. This development will be showcased at Consensus Miami 2026, where a historic lineup of institutional heavyweights, federal policymakers, and crypto pioneers will convene from May 5-7 to explore the convergence of traditional finance and digital assets.
For the first time, CFTC Chairman Michael Selig, Senator Ashley Moody, and White House official Patrick Witt will attend a Consensus event, joined by debut sponsors Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan, alongside returning partners such as Fidelity, Mastercard, and Bridge by Stripe. The conference anticipates over 15,000 attendees, with institutional attendance expected to nearly double to approximately 35% of the audience.
This represents an estimated $10 trillion in assets under management, according to Brad Spies, Vice President of Consensus. "We've reached a point where finance, crypto, tech, and policy are converging forces," Spies said. "The achievements we thought were far off in the future - policy wins, institutional adoption, widespread stablecoin usage - are now within our grasp." The lineup includes notable figures such as Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko, Strategy's Michael Saylor, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, and Bullish CEO Tom Farley, alongside Cloudflare Chief Strategy Officer Stephanie Cohen, Shark Tank's Kevin O'Leary, and Tether U.S.
CEO Bo Hines. The institutional contingent is equally impressive, featuring Morgan Stanley's Jed Finn and Amy Oldenburg, ICE's Michael Blaugrund, Nasdaq's Tal Cohen, and DTCC's Frank La Salla, joined by senior executives from Charles Schwab, Franklin Templeton, JPMorgan, and Citi. The fintech side will be represented by Mastercard's Raja Rajamannar, Robinhood's Johann Kerbrat, and MoneyGram's Anthony SooHoo.
Key topics of discussion will include the future of stablecoins in light of the GENIUS Act and potentially the CLARITY Act, agentic commerce, tokenization, and the implications of quantum computing for the industry. Over 20 sessions will focus on agentic commerce, highlighted by a panel titled "The Trillion Dollar Question - What's the Framework for Agentic Payments?" featuring Erik Reppel, founder of Coinbase's payments protocol x402.
The conference will kick off with its Institutional Summit at The Ritz-Carlton on May 5, bringing together institutional investors and asset managers to discuss the flow of new capital into digital assets. Speakers will include Vanessa Melendez of Accent Partners, Nick Maffeo of ERS of Texas, Alex Pack of Hack VC, Tushar Jain of Multicoin Capital, and Timothy Barrett of Texas Tech University Systems, covering topics such as prediction markets, equity tokenization, and the reevaluation of crypto allocation amid market volatility.
Wealth Management Day will follow, tailored for financial advisors, addressing how high-net-worth individuals can engage with digital assets, how crypto fits into IRA retirement accounts, and how the advisory industry can provide holistic planning around digital holdings, including generational wealth transfer. For the wealth management community, the timing is critical.
"I see the crypto space as a great opportunity for the wealth management field," said Christina Lynn of Mariner Wealth Advisors, attending Wealth Management Day for the first time. "Financial advisors are slowly adopting and becoming more familiar with crypto topics, but we're just scratching the surface." Lynn warned that advisors who wait too long risk losing clients to a do-it-yourself approach.
"Clients and prospects are making their own crypto investments without an advisor, introducing risks and not integrating with the rest of their portfolio or planning advice," she said. "If we don't address this and bring crypto into our fold, it will become a bigger concern." Charles Schwab, preparing to launch Schwab Crypto for its millions of retail investors, is formally participating in Consensus for the first time.
"Consensus is one of the most influential annual gatherings of the digital assets community, making it a natural fit for Schwab," said Joe Vietri, head of digital assets at the firm. "If you're not informing yourself, you're asking to become a dinosaur," said Matthew Tuttle, who leads leveraged ETF issuer Tuttle Capital Management, and is attending Consensus to deepen his understanding of stablecoins and tokenization. "The next big thing is stablecoins, but I haven't yet fully grasped the 'why and how' they work," Tuttle said. "Then there's tokenization, which will affect our industry.
I don't know exactly how yet, but I know I'll be discussing it more in five years. If you're an ETF issuer and not informing yourself about this, you're asking to become a dinosaur." Tuttle recently filed to launch the T-Strive Digital Credit ETF (DGCR), which will invest in bitcoin treasury firms' preferred stock, yielding roughly 10% annually. He intends to pay investors 14% per year.
His conviction in the space has shifted decisively. "There's so much institutional backing that I don't see how BTC can go to zero anymore," he said. "Ten years ago, I'd say it could, but now I'm buying."