Standard Chartered to Launch Bitcoin and Ether Trading Desk: Report

British multinational bank Standard Chartered is set to roll out a trading desk for Bitcoin and Ether. The latest development makes it one of the first global banks to engage in spot cryptocurrency trading.

Standard Chartered has been engaging with players in the digital asset space for quite some time and has also partnered with various entities amid rising demand for crypto exposure.

Standard Chartered Ventures in spot trading

According to two anonymous sources cited by Bloomberg’s latest report, the new crypto desk is almost operational and will be integrated into the bank’s foreign exchange trading unit. A source also revealed that it will be based in London.

The bank has yet to confirm its latest initiative, but highlighted the growing demand for Bitcoin and Ethereum from its institutional clients. An email statement on the matter was read,

“We have been working closely with our regulators to support our institutional clients’ demand to trade Bitcoin and Ethereum, in line with our strategy to support clients in the wider digital asset ecosystem, from access and custody to tokenization and interoperability.”

Alongside several major players, Standard Chartered has begun expanding further into the digital assets sector to meet growing institutional demand. The bank currently has stakes in two cryptocurrency companies, Zodia Custody and Zodia Markets, which offer services ranging from custody to over-the-counter trading.

Coinbase announced a strategic banking partnership with Standard Chartered for users in Singapore in March last year.

A few months later, Standard Chartered launched “Libeara”, a blockchain division to help institutional players tokenize traditional assets. The unit is currently focused on developing a Singapore dollar-denominated tokenized government bond fund.

Standard Chartered Bullish on Digital Assets

In a blog post in February this year, the bank said it sees digital assets as an important and permanent part of the future of financial services, while also considering the potential of stablecoins.

The bank has also been extremely optimistic while forecasting Bitcoin’s price movements and even predicted that the cryptocurrency could reach $250,000 by 2025 if spot ETF inflows hit the average estimate of $75 billion. dollars

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