Backpack founder: After the Wall Street API, small teams have the opportunity to build the next generation of financial applications.

Backpack founder and CEO Armani Ferrante said on the Rollup podcast that once Wall Street functions become developer-accessible APIs, programmable finance will open the door for small teams to build the next generation of financial applications. He argued that launching a brokerage in the U.S. has historically been a Herculean task, making it hard for a five-person dorm team to build the next Robinhood, but API access to Wall Street would sharply lower that barrier. As examples, he cited efforts to split SpaceX equity into exposure to revenue streams such as Starlink or space data centers, and to let individuals easily assemble custom ETFs. He also noted that traditional ETFs like SPY charge about 7 to 9 basis points on assets under management, while on-chain smart-contract automation could cut fees to 1 basis point or even zero. The remarks matter because they frame API-driven Wall Street access as the catalyst for a new wave of low-cost, composable financial products. What to watch next is whether brokerages and asset managers actually expose their infrastructure as APIs, and whether on-chain ETF rebuilds gain traction with users.