Standard Chartered is Taking Over Full Crypto Custody Platform Zodia
Standard Chartered is planning to reabsorb the client-facing custody operations of Zodia Custody into the digital property division of its Corporate and Investment Bank (CIB).
The restructuring, which could possibly be introduced as early as this month, would depart Zodia working solely as a standalone Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform for custody know-how, based on Bloomberg sources acquainted with the matter.
From Incubation to Independence to Reabsorption
Standard Chartered established Zodia Custody in late 2020 by way of its innovation arm SC Ventures, alongside Northern Trust.
The custodian later attracted minority traders, together with SBI Holdings, National Australia Bank, and Emirates NBD. It now employs round 150 folks throughout seven places of work globally.
Zodia had been gaining traction. In January 2026, it grew to become the primary custodian to help AUDM, an Australian greenback stablecoin.
The following month, it launched Zodia Switch, enabling shoppers to swap property instantly inside the custody platform with out exterior pre-funding.
However, Standard Chartered launched its own Luxembourg-based digital asset custody final 12 months and rolled out institutional crypto buying and selling individually.
The overlap between guardian and subsidiary made a restructuring doubtless.
It stays unclear whether or not Standard Chartered has consulted Zodia’s minority shareholders.
Banks Are Pulling Custody In-House
The digital asset custody market at present exceeds $1 trillion and is projected to achieve $7 trillion by 2035 at a compound annual development charge of roughly 23.7%.
According to the 2026 EY-Parthenon survey, 73% of institutional traders plan to extend digital asset allocations this 12 months.
That rising demand is pulling banks deeper into direct custody. State Street and BNY Mellon have scaled inside digital custody divisions.
Morgan Stanley filed for a dedicated national trust bank charter in February to custody and stake crypto property below federal supervision.
Analysts see the restructuring as a turning level, with some arguing that when a Tier-1 international financial institution strikes crypto custody into its funding financial institution, it stops being a contest between crypto and TradFi and turns into crypto embedded inside TradFi.
Zodia was initially constructed as a standalone automobile to check the waters safely, and its reabsorption solely occurs when the guardian sees digital property as actual, fee-generating capital markets enterprise.
Meanwhile, others recommend a wider sample of conventional banks pulling digital asset features from experimental ventures into core regulated operations, noting that operating parallel companies was merely inefficient.
“…The fits lastly realized operating the identical factor twice is inefficient. Revolutionary,” one person stated.
What This Says About Crypto Custody Independence
The reply seems more and more clear. Independence for bank-backed custodians served a selected goal in the course of the experimental part of 2020-2023, when regulatory uncertainty made arm’s-length buildings needed.
Now that frameworks like MiCA in Europe and the GENIUS Act in the US have lowered that friction, banks not want buffer entities to have interaction with digital property.
“This mirrors a wider pattern of conventional banks pulling digital asset features from experimental ventures into core regulated ops – pushed by frameworks like MiCA and VARA,” the person added.
Zodia’s hybrid consequence is telling. The know-how retains standalone worth as SaaS, however the precise safekeeping of consumer property, the highest-trust and highest-margin piece of the worth chain, strikes again onto the guardian financial institution’s books.
That distinction reveals what banks really wish to personal versus what they’re prepared to license out.
Crypto-native custodians like Coinbase Custody, BitGo, and Fireblocks nonetheless maintain almost half the worldwide market.
Can they defend that share in opposition to a banking sector now decided to convey custody in-house?
The submit Standard Chartered is Taking Over Full Crypto Custody Platform Zodia appeared first on BeInCrypto.
