SEBA Bank, a FINMA registered bank in Switzerland, has announced that it has secured a license to be a custodian bank for Swiss collective investment schemes for digital assets.
Switzerland has been at the forefront of regulating the crypto industry and the regulators in the country have taken a positive and proactive approach to the same and have been quite lenient to the industry. They have lent an ear to all the different feedback that they have received about the various crypto-related businesses and have shaped their laws and regulations by keeping an open mind. As a result of this, the country is fast becoming the go-to place for crypto industries that are looking for open jurisdictions that are favorable to the crypto ecosystem, unlike certain other regions which have basically shut down the crypto industry and its associated innovations.
This is the first such license granted by FINMA to a custodian bank that is focused on digital assets and it is expected that many would follow shortly. It is expected that this license would help the SEBA bank to begin to provide custodial services to government-approved mutual funds that hold digital assets which would help form a bridge between traditional and crypto investments and improve the profile of crypto assets amidst the investor community.
Guido Buehler, CEO of SEBA Bank, states, “Two years ago SEBA Bank received a Swiss banking and securities firm license and is now enjoying excellent business momentum as institutional adoption of crypto & digital assets accelerate globally. With our new CISA license, SEBA Bank continues its pioneering role in the institutional digital asset space. Asset Managers can now offer strategies based on crypto or other digital asset underlying to a broader audience utilizing Swiss-based mutual fund structures secured by SEBA Bank as the CISA-licensed custodian.”
The company would be looking to expand this service across Europe and this would help to increase awareness about digital assets and would also send out a message to the mainstream users that the cryptos are here to stay and can be used as an investment class just like stocks and commodities. It is this attitudinal change that the crypto industry is looking forward to and seems to be inching towards over the last couple of years. Companies like SEBA Bank are also helping in this cause with the support of regulators around the world.
