According to a press release on Tuesday, Bank of New York Mellon (BK), the country's oldest lender and largest custodian bank is now offering cryptocurrency custody services. 

By tapping into the popularity of bitcoins and Ether, the bank hopes to attract a wide range of investors and traders to its services. 

Throughout the past few years, the trading of cryptocurrencies has skyrocketed, attracting a wide range of traditional institutions to an asset that, until recently, Wall Street shunned because of its volatility and the increased scrutiny it faced. 

The fund managers now have a user-friendly way to store their private keys that can be used to access and move around the bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH) they own, as well as perform other traditional bookkeeping functions that are necessary for this to happen. 

As part of its commitment to developing solutions using digital assets, BNY formed a Digital Assets Unit in 2021, tapping companies Fireblocks and Chainalysis, which specialize in digital asset technology, according to a statement. 

BNY Mellon won approval from New York's financial regulator and became the first of eight banks in the United States to store digital currencies. Earlier this week, the Wall Street Journal reported that the bank would offer customers a single custody platform for both traditional and crypto holdings. 

In April 2022, Circle Financial chose BNY Mellon to become a custody partner for the USDC-based stablecoin. Following that, it invested in Talos, an institution-specific digital asset technology provider. 

Pavan A

CBW - External Analyst

INDIA