According to Wall Street Journal (WSJ) report, on Tuesday Fidelity Digital Assets which digital assets subsidiary of financial services giant Fidelity Investments, is planning to expand its offerings beyond bitcoin. The firm seeking to add trading of ether and custody services to its cryptocurrency business. To support this the firm has planned to expand its hiring efforts this year.

The firm is planning to add 110 employees in tech roles, recruiting engineers and developers with blockchain experience to meet the growing demand for crypto trading from institutional investors said president Tom Jessop as per the report.

Till now the company was only offering the ability to store and trade bitcoin to the institutional investors. These new hires will support in building out infrastructure that will support custody and trading services for ether. The firm focuses to provide faster transactions and 24-hour trading support including compliance and tax-reporting tools.

Fidelity Digital Assets is founded in 2018. Currently, there are 200 people. Fidelity’s product manager, Terrence Dempsey said Fidelity Digital Assets has around 400 clients currently which includes registered investment advisers, hedge funds, and asset managers.

Recently in April Fidelity Investments announced allowing customers to invest in bitcoin with their 401(k) plans later this year, the first major retirement-plan provider to embrace cryptocurrency as a savings vehicle. After this, the move by Fidelity Digital Asset Services comes.

In spite of the recent decline in cryptocurrency prices, the company plans to invest in crypto-trading technology. During the past month, the crypto market has shed nearly $500 billion. Although declines in crypto prices have had no significant impact on the company's business, the executive continues to focus on longer-term indicators, such as client demand.

On Tuesday Bitcoin traded higher above $31,000. in May it was heading for a 16% decline. It's lost roughly 31% year to date. On Tuesday Ether also rose to trade at $1,960. It was down about 29% in May and 47% so far in 2022.

Indrani bose

CBW - External Analyst

INDIA