Breaking News! Standard Chartered Bank has just obtained a digital asset license in Luxembourg!
Now they can engage in cryptocurrency custody services in Europe. To highlight, they will initially focus on the custody of Bitcoin and Ethereum, with plans to expand to more cryptocurrencies later.
Standard Chartered's move is quite clever; they have brought in Laurent Marochini, a former executive from Société Générale, to serve as the CEO in Luxembourg. However, they are currently only offering custody services and are not involved in trading.
Speaking of which, Standard Chartered launched a similar service in the UAE last September, indicating they aim for global expansion!
Interestingly, Standard Chartered's new company in Luxembourg must operate under the EU's newly introduced MiCA regulations. Their head of digital assets, Waqar Chaudry, mentioned that they plan to add more assets this year.
The head of global finance services at Standard Chartered also stated that this is an innovative product that will change the landscape of traditional finance, which sounds quite impressive!
Standard Chartered is genuinely optimistic about the cryptocurrency market; they not only support Zodia Custody (custody institution) and Zodia Markets (trading department) but have also created a platform called Libeara for RWA tokenization.