Standard Chartered-owned crypto firm Zodia launches in Singapore
Zodia Custody, a company that helps large institutions store their crypto, launched in Singapore on Tuesday in a bid to tap into the country's rapidly growing digital asset market.
The development makes Zodia the first entity that is owned by and partnered with banks to provide digital asset custody services for financial institutions in Singapore, Zodia said in a news release.
Zodia is a subsidiary of Standard Chartered, the British bank with a presence largely in emerging markets, such as Asia, Africa and the Middle East. StanChart launched Zodia in 2021 alongside Northern Trust, in a move that highlighted curiosity from big institutions in interacting with digital currencies. Zodia is also part-owned by SBI Digital Asset Holdings, the crypto division of Japanese bank SBI. As part of that deal, SBI also agreed to launch its custody business in Japan.
Zodia said it wants to expand across Asia-Pacific to cater to growing demand from institutions for bank-grade custody of digital assets, as well as demand from existing clients in the region, the company said.
Singapore is «getting to that next level of maturity» in terms of forming rules for cryptoassets and the development of central bank digital currencies, Zodia CEO Julian Sawyer told CNBC in a phone call. Sawyer was previously a co-founder of Starling Bank.
«Singapore is a market that has been no stranger to the crypto world for a long time,» Sawyer said. «We want to be part of it. We think that the market of a bank owned custodian is actually what the market is wanting.»
Zodia works with clients ranging from hedge funds and high frequency traders to prime brokers, exchanges, and asset managers.
Standard Chartered has a «fantastic brand» in Singapore, Sawyer said,
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