Citi plans to launch bitcoin custody for institutional clients later this year The Wall Street bank plans to let clients hold bitcoin alongside traditional assets through its new Custody+ platform. – Citi plans to launch bitcoin custody later this year, allowing institutional…
ients to hold BTC alongside traditional assets. – The service will be part of Citi’s new Custody+ platform, which combines custody, settlement and other services for large investors. – The move could make it easier for institutions to hold bitcoin through a major bank instead of relying on a separate crypto custodian. Citigroup plans to begin offering bitcoin custody later this year, bringing crypto into the same infrastructure it uses to safeguard traditional assets for institutional investors
On Tuesday, the bank’s institutional infrastructure arm announced the launch of Custody+, a suite of services designed to make custody, settlement, foreign exchange and cash management faster. The service, which does not yet have a launch date, will start with bitcoin Citi’s custody operation serves clients in more than 100 markets, including 62 markets where it runs its own custody network. By adding bitcoin custody, those clients could keep their bitcoin with the same bank that holds their stocks and bonds, making it easier for some institutions to invest in bitcoin without using a separate crypto custodian. “Custody+ is the product of a multi-year commitment to building infrastructure that matches the speed of our clients’ strategies,” Amit Agarwal, head of custody at Citi Investor Services, said in a statement.
The bitcoin custody plans are part of a wider effort by Citi to make its systems faster. The bank has rolled out new technology in the U.S. that processes many custody-related tasks through one system instead of passing them through several steps. The bank said more than 80% of these events are now processed in real time and that its new system has cut processing times for these events by…