Deutsche Bank plans to launch a digital asset custody service aimed at institutional and corporate clients before the end of this year, with which they will be able to safeguard their cryptocurrencies and make transfers to third parties.
The proposal will allow operations with digital assets such as Bitcoin and Ether, in addition to certain stablecoins and electronic money tokens, including USDC, EURC, and EURAU. The entity intends to gradually expand this list based on client interest and the bank's internal product approval procedures. Likewise, tokenized financial instruments are part of the roadmap.
Deutsche Bank will take over the management of the portfolios on behalf of its clients, so the new service will minimize the need for them to develop and maintain their own custody infrastructure.
The German bank emphasizes that security will be one of the central axes of the offering, which will integrate secure key generation and hardware-based protection, separation of functions, approval processes involving multiple people, differentiated hot and cold storage environments, a redundant technical architecture, and controlled backup and recovery systems.
In this first phase, the solution will target clients from Corporate Banking and Investment Banking, including companies, asset managers, hedge funds, custodians, intermediaries, and sovereign entities. The onboarding of clients will be subject to the bank's internal criteria, due diligence requirements, and the level of risk deemed acceptable.
"Digital assets do not replace the traditional financial system, but rather complement it significantly. We consider them as new avenues that can coexist with existing market infrastructures, benefiting from the trust, security, and guarantees offered by regulated financial institutions. Our goal is to provide clients with secure and regulated access to this constantly evolving market," said the co-director of Corporate Banking at Deutsche Bank, Gerald Podobnik.