Deutsche Bank Joins Forces With Taurus For Crypto Asset Management

Germany’s largest bank by market capitalization, Deutsche Bank, has collaborated with Taurus, a Swiss crypto company, to help its institutional customers handle tokenized assets, cryptocurrencies, and other digital currencies. The partnership was made public on September 14, 2023.

This collaboration will let the bank store digital cryptocurrencies and digital versions of regular financial assets. However, it is vital to note that the bank plans to wait to start trading cryptocurrencies due to regulations.

Deutsche Bank asked BaFin, Germany’s financial regulator, for a license to provide cryptocurrency custody services in June. This was part of the bank’s bigger plan to spread out in the digital asset industry.

It has been studying this move since early 2021, as stated in a report from the World Economic Forum about its prototype for digital asset custody.

Deutsche Bank Will Utilize Taurus’s Technology

In partnership with Taurus, Deutsche Bank will use Taurus’s technology to create services for safely storing and digitizing assets. Established in 2018, Taurus provides a high-quality digital asset structure for managing and trading digital currencies, NFTs, tokenized assets, and cryptocurrencies.

The security services leader at Deutsche Bank, Paul Maley, said the digital asset industry is expected to hit trillions of dollars in assets. Because of this, custodians must adjust to help their customers. That’s why the bank is partnering with Taurus, a first-class company with a solid tokenization and crypto custody background.

In February this year, Deutsche Bank partook in a funding round that raised $65 million for the Swiss company. Other investors included Arab Bank Switzerland and Credit Suisse Pictet Group. Deutsche Bank had been checking out potential crypto custody companies since the end of 2021, and it wrapped up that process sometime in 2022.

Deutsche Bank Is Threading Cautiously

In an interview with CoinDesk, co-founder of Taurus, Lamine Brahimi, pointed out that while the collaboration focuses mainly on cryptocurrencies, Taurus is known for its experience exceeding just digital currencies. Additionally, the partnership paves the way for the bank to provide various asset-related services, guaranteeing comprehensive support for its customers in the evolving digital asset space. This flexibility is vital as the world of finance continues to integrate digital assets into its ecosystem.

Maley highlighted that the Deutsche Bank is moving cautiously and following regulations to prevent any potential negative impact on its other banking activities. He further explained that their custody services and product design are created in a way that reduces the risk of causing problems for the bank’s main products.