Bitcoin buying and selling up 80% at DBS Financial institution resulting from crypto crashes in 2022, says exec

by Jeremy

Singapore government-owned megabank DBS is among the many few corporations world wide that reaped main advantages from large cryptocurrency collapses in 2022.

DBS Digital Change, DBS Financial institution’s institutional crypto buying and selling platform, noticed a major improve in Bitcoin (BTC) buying and selling volumes final 12 months. In line with DBS Digital Change CEO Lionel Lim, the variety of DBS crypto shoppers greater than doubled in 2022 in comparison with the earlier 12 months.

“Bitcoin buying and selling volumes grew 80% on the digital alternate throughout the identical interval,” Lim mentioned in an interview with Cointelegraph on Could 8.

The chief believes that the spike in demand for crypto companies at DBS Digital Change is a consequence of crypto alternate collapses in 2022. Lim famous that DBS continues seeing a rising pattern in volumes. He said:

“DBS continues to profit from the flight to security and high quality following the implosion of a number of exchanges final 12 months.”

Evy Theunis, head of digital property at DBS Financial institution, additionally informed Cointelegraph that DBS has seen extra cooperation enquiries from digital asset and blockchain companies in current months.

Launched in 2020, DBS’ cryptocurrency alternate serves solely institutional traders. Regardless of contemplating increasing companies to retail prospects final 12 months, DBS continues to be a members-only alternate serving company and institutional traders as of Could 2023, Lim famous.

FTX is without doubt one of the greatest crypto exchanges that subsided in 2022. Earlier than FTX collapsed in November 2022, the platform traded a major quantity of crypto coming from institutional traders. In March 2022, FTX launched a devoted unit working with establishments. On the time, about two-thirds of buying and selling volumes on FTX and FTX US had been reportedly coming from institutional accounts.

Whereas indicating a constructive influence from crypto alternate crashes in 2022, DBS Digital Change CEO sees no affect coming from the ongoing banking disaster in america.

Associated: Concern over banking disaster reaches ranges unseen since 2008 — Ballot

“A few of our market makers sought new USD banking rails following the collapse of the crypto-friendly US banks,” Lim mentioned. Nonetheless, there was no direct influence on DBS’ crypto alternate, he famous, stating:

“The collapse of the US banks has not impacted our product and repair pipeline. That mentioned, we maintain a detailed watch on these developments and are ready to regulate our plans if needed.”

Whereas being a crypto-friendly financial institution itself, DBS isn’t nervous about any dangers allegedly stemming from its crypto publicity.

“DBS doesn’t rehypothecate or commerce digital property in shoppers’ custody. As such, there is no such thing as a liquidity threat,” Lim informed Cointelegraph. “Our shoppers’ digital property are in custody with DBS Financial institution, separate from DBS Digital Change,” the CEO famous.

Journal: Unstablecoins: Depegging, financial institution runs and different dangers loom