X brings crypto trading closer to your social feed

Crypto Twitter (now X) has always been a place where someone with an illustrated animal for a profile picture can explain why your financial future depends on a token you just learned about. Now X’s Cashtag links are shortening the route from that conversation to a crypto exchange.Kraken joined X's US Cashtag partner program on Sept. 16, giving users another route from tickers such as $BTC to its exchange. Tapping a Cashtag can bring up posts and a price chart on X, while the trading link sends users to Kraken's app or website, where they sign in or register and complete the purchase.Kraken's announcement describes this as a way to become easier to find inside applications people already use. That's the important part of the deal. X isn't becoming an exchange, and the trade itself still happens at Kraken. What changes is the distance between discovering an asset and reaching somewhere that sells it.That distance has historically been surprisingly long for crypto. Someone might first hear about Bitcoin on X, read a thread explaining it, search for the price somewhere else, compare exchanges, open an account, fund it, and eventually return to the asset they were interested in several...