Standard Chartered (STAN) intends to provide safekeeping services in Singapore for specific digital currencies, stablecoins, and tokenized real-world assets, broadening a digital asset footprint that currently spans financial centers such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Luxembourg, and Hong Kong.
The offering, which depends on fulfilling necessary regulatory conditions, will cater to institutional participants as well as corporate clients classified as accredited investors, the institution stated on Thursday. The solution will be housed under Standard Chartered’s financing and securities-services division instead of functioning as a retail-facing cryptocurrency tool.
“As adoption grows, we are seeing institutional use cases and client interest emerge around tokenised funds, ETFs and precious metals, as clients look for more efficient ways to hold, transfer and mobilise assets,” Ying Ying Tan, global head of digital assets and securities services at Standard Chartered told CoinDesk via email.
“Our Singapore launch further strengthens our ability to help clients bridge traditional and digital markets through secure, regulated and bank-grade infrastructure,” she added.
This initiative is not unprecedented among major international banks. For instance, BNY broadened its digital-asset custody framework to incorporate USDC storage and creation, subsequently introducing staking capabilities.
Nevertheless, this development brings Standard Chartered’s custody capabilities to Singapore—a prominent Asian hub for wealth management and digital assets—while explicitly including stablecoins and tokenized instruments alongside standard cryptocurrencies.
Standard Chartered has been developing this sector via its custody division, Zodia. The lender reached an agreement in May to buy out the remaining stake in Zodia Custody, an enterprise it initially established alongside Northern Trust, and in the previous month commenced spot bitcoin and ether trading for institutions through the foreign-exchange platform of its Dubai branch.
Regarding its presence in Singapore, the organization noted that the anticipated safekeeping service aims to assist users throughout the complete lifecycle of assets, ranging from the protection of conventional holdings to the creation and maintenance of their tokenized equivalents.
Patrick Lee, the chief executive officer for Standard Chartered in Singapore, mentioned that the company observes increasing institutional appetite for reliable systems capable of moving and securing tokenized holdings. The disclosure did not specify which particular digital coins, stablecoins, or tokenized items will be included upon launch, nor did it provide a specific rollout date.
Originally published at https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/10/08/standard-chartered-singapore-dives-into-crypto-stablecoins-and-tokenized-assets-custody.
