Gazprombank, a Swiss-based bank that is a subsidiary of Russia’s largest government-owned energy behemoth, Gazprom, has received the green light to provide cryptocurrency services to institutional customers.
According to a press release on October 29, Gazprombank’s Swiss-based subsidiary received approval from Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) to provide crypto custody and trading services to a limited number of institutional and corporate customers. This comes exactly two years since the bank started preparing to offer cryptocurrency services in Switzerland.
Initially, clients will be allowed to trade bitcoin against fiat currencies as it will be the only supported crypto. Gazprombank, however, plans to add support for more cryptocurrencies as well as onboarding more institutional and corporate customers in the future.
Additionally, clients will be able to safely store their bitcoin holdings in the bank’s institutional-grade custody solutions. In particular, the safe storage of customers’ assets will be provided by a bank regulated by Swiss authorities, hence minimizing the counterparty risk.
