Tag: Dbs

DBS Offers 4 Crypto Trading for Premium Clients in Singapore

by Blockchain News

Singapore-based banking giant DBS announced Friday that it has launched crypto trading through its digibank, enabling accredited investors to trade four cryptocurrencies on its digital exchange.

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The launch of the crypto trading feature comes at a time when DBS wealth clients are increasingly choosing self-directed options, with 9 out of 10 equity transactions executed digitally currently.

By investing from a minimum investment of USD 500, accredited premium clients can trade four of the more established cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Ethereum (ETH), XRP on its digital exchange (DDEx).

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The largest bank in Singapore said “having their cryptocurrency holdings makes it easier for clients to stay on top of their investments across traditional and alternative asset classes.”

Senionr executive of the DBS, commented about the latest movement, and said this move would help their clients to grow and protect their wealth. Sim S. Lim, Group Executive, Consumer Banking and Wealth Management, DBS Bank, said:

“We believe in staying ahead of the curve and providing access to the solutions they seek. Broadening access to DDEx is yet another step in our efforts to provide sophisticated investors looking to dip their toes in cryptocurrencies with a seamless and secure way to do so.” 

DBS established digital exchange around two years ago and received a cryptocurrency license from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) last year. Per the statement, crypto trading on DDEX was initially “limited to corporate and institutional investors, family offices, and clients of DBS Private Bank and DBS Treasures Private Client only,“

The latest service would also be available to accredited investors in its Treasures segment. DBS said around 100,000 of their clients in Singapore will be able to access the services offered by DBS’ digital asset ecosystem.

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Singapore’s DBS Acquires Land in The Sandbox Metaverse

by Blockchain News

The Development Bank of Singapore (DBS), a multinational financial institution based in Marina Bay Singapore has proposed to secure land in The Sandbox metaverse which is an arm of Animoca Brands, a blockchain virtual, and investment firm.

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DBS is set to acquire a 3×3 LAND piece in The Sandbox metaverse, a type of virtual property to experience a better and more sustainable world according to a report.

DBS asserts that it is both the first Singaporean business to collaborate with The Sandbox and the first regional bank to engage with the metaverse. The bank declared that it will also purchase carbon offsets to make its metaverse carbon neutral.

“As we stretch the limits of what the metaverse can do, our cooperation with The Sandbox and Animoca Brands represents the beginning of a thrilling collaboration,” said Piyush Gupta, CEO of DBS, “We also look forward to using it as an extra cutting-edge platform to raise awareness of crucial ESG (environmental, social, and governance) concerns and to highlight partners and communities doing admirable work to solve them’’.

DBS Emerging as a Frontier in the Digital Space

DBS’s acquisition of The Sandbox’s property comes after the launch of its crypto exchange for Bitcoin (BTC), Ripple (XRP), Ethereum (ETH), and other altcoins in 2020. According to Gupta, the DBS exchange appears to be the first cryptocurrency exchange that would be backed by a traditional bank.

The multinational bank claimed that despite a significant global decline in the value of digital assets, its purchases of Bitcoin accounted for 90% of all crypto trading activities. The bank has witnessed a high amount of digital exchange which caters to family exchange and institutional investors.

Animoca Brands earlier received new money worth $110 million through the sale of convertible notes according. The Convertible Notes, which were issued at a price of AU$4.5 ($3) and have a three-year expiration date, do not alter the company’s valuation from its previous investment round as stated by the firm.

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Singapore’s DBS Bank Expects to Expand Crypto offering for High-net-worth Clients

by Blockchain News

Facing the bear market of cryptocurrencies, Singapore’s largest bank DBS Bank (DBS), still plans to expand its cryptocurrency and digital asset business and provide cryptocurrency and digital asset services to 300,000 high-net-worth clients in Asia, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.

Investors nowadays are looking for a safe haven to trade and store their digital assets amid ongoing market volatility.

DBS CEO Piyush Gupta said in an interview, “On the one hand, we want to be a global crypto hub. On the other hand, we’re also very worried about our domestic population getting burned with this speculative asset class,”

DBS chief Executive Piyush Gupta said the bank currently has less than 1,000 members on digital exchanges.

Gupta said the bank’s cryptocurrency services would soon be available to DBS’s 300,000 clients in Asia, including private banks, accredited investors, other exchanges, and funds.

DBS Bank launched its digital exchange in December 2020, which serves institutional investors and family offices.

The Financial Times reported that DBS’ brokerage arm received a cryptocurrency license from the Monetary Authority of Singapore last year and has since allowed fewer than 1,000 institutional and wealthy clients to access its digital currency by invitation.

In February, DBS Bank announced plans to expand its cryptocurrency exchange beyond its existing institutional client investor base.

While the bank confirmed that it would focus on scaling up its crypto exchange business in 2022, it hinted that it would not be able to roll out digital asset trading to retail investors.

The bank delayed plans to offer crypto trading to retail investors, citing technical challenges and resistance from regulators.

In contrast to the massive global digital asset market downturn, the multinational bank said its bitcoin trading volume more than doubled in June from the previous two months, accounting for 90% of cryptocurrency trading activity.

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Singapore Regulator MAS is Exploring Use of Cases in Digital Assets

by Blockchain News

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has launched Project Guardian. This sandbox initiative is set to explore a number of defined use cases with respect to asset tokenisation on the blockchain. 

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Project Guardian was floated in partnership with DBS Bank, JPMorgan Chase and Marketnote. Per the announcement, the MAS and its partners will “test the feasibility of applications in asset tokenisation and DeFi while managing risks to financial stability and integrity.” The project will explore use cases in 4 categories, including Open, interoperable networks, Trust anchors, Asset tokenisation, and Institutional grade DeFi protocols.

Within the context of its announcement, the MAS defined tokenisation as “the process of digitally representing assets or items of value through a smart contract on a blockchain. This allows high value financial and real economy assets to be fractionalised and exchanged over the internet on a peer-to-peer basis.”

Per its goals, the Singapore banking regulator seeks avenues whereby the emerging DeFi and smart contract governed finance services world will be brought under appropriate regulatory oversight in a bid to provide encompassing benefits to all industry participants.

“MAS is closely monitoring innovations and growth in the digital asset ecosystem and working through the potential opportunities and risks that come with new technologies – to consumers, investors and the financial system at large. Through practical experimentation with the financial industry and the broader ecosystem, we seek to sharpen our understanding of this rapidly transforming digital assets ecosystem. The learnings from Project Guardian will serve to inform policy markets on the regulatory guardrails that are needed to harness the benefits of DeFi while mitigating its risks,” said Sopnendu Mohanty, Chief FinTech Officer MAS.

While it defined the 4 primary areas it wishes to focus its exploration on, the MAS said additional innovations can be shared by industry participants provided they align with the overall goal it aims to achieve, a move that is contrary to earlier attempts to tighten anything crypto business activities.

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DBS Declines to Offer Crypto Services to Retail Customers as Regulation Stiffens

by Blockchain News

Piyush Gupta, the Chief Executive Officer of DBS Bank Limited, a multinational bank headquartered in Singapore, announced on Friday that the global bank will not provide cryptocurrency trading for retail clients this year.

While speaking during the bank’s results briefing on Friday, the executive cited that regulators are not comfortable with cryptocurrency trading for retail investors. However, Gupta admitted that he would have loved to see the service launched this year, but the process is taking a bit longer than expected. Currently, DBS is providing crypto trading only for institutional clients and accredited investors.

Gupta, therefore, mentioned that DBS will examine whether it will be able to expand its cryptocurrency trading to retail investors in 2023 at the earliest.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), the Central Bank and financial regulatory authority of Singapore, is against trading cryptocurrencies for the general public (retail consumers). The regulator maintains that the trading of cryptos is highly risky and not suitable for the general public.

Recently, the Singapore Central Bank noticed that some crypto service providers have been actively promoting their services through online and physical advertisements and in public areas, which encourage consumers to trade digital coins on impulse, without fully understanding the risks. As a result, in January, the regulator imposed a ban on crypto marketing activities that target the general public.

Making Digital Assets Accessible

DBS has been offering crypto services to some clients for quite some time. In December 2020, the bank set up a digital asset exchange that enables institutional investors and accredited investors to trade digital assets that include cryptos and asset tokenization.

The launch followed the approval of the Central Bank to recognize DBS Digital Exchange as a recognized market operator. Since DBS launched its digital asset exchange platform, it has witnessed rapid growth in its crypto business.

In February, the bank announced plans to launch crypto trading for retail investors this year.

 

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DBS Eyeing for the Metaverse

by Blockchain News

Singapore-based bank DBS, the largest financial institution in the ASEAN, is reportedly eyeing a move into the metaverse, a trend that many banking giants are looking to become pioneers in.

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As contained in an interview with Nikkei Asia, DBS’s Chief Information Officer, Jimmy Ng, confirmed the bank’s strategy now involves a dive into new technological innovations, including the metaverse.

New Diversification for Tech Research Funds

DBS has earned its mark as a financial institution that heavily invested in new tech as it earmarks as much as 1 billion Singapore dollars ($730 million) annually. The bank is now ready to divest some of the funds into the metaverse, in a bid to cement its digital banking push.

“There are a few key technologies that we are looking at. One of them, of course, is the metaverse,” Ng said. “We are actively exploring this space even as it evolves.”

The plan does not come as a surprise for a bank like DBS, one of the few outfits licensed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to operate a cryptocurrency trading platform in the country. While Ng did not give more explanations on what the metaverse push will entail, Ng confirmed that Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) would play a major part as both technologies are highly interwoven.

One of the ways Ng said the bank will get involved with the metaverse is probably by setting up an avenue by which its clients can access the bank’s services through the metaverse. He affirmed that “the way we do banking can be imported to very different platforms, such as the metaverse.”

“We believe that over time, emerging technologies such as blockchain, [augmented reality] and [virtual reality] will converge to create very interesting use cases that we have never imagined,” he said.

Back in January, JPMorgan Chase & Co set up a version of its Onyx platform on Decentraland, coming off as one of the major banking firms to fully explore the capabilities of the metaverse. With the new pursuit, DBS will not play second fiddle to its peers in the race for the metaverse.

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Singaporean DBS Bank to Expand Bitcoin Offerings to Retail Traders

by Blockchain News

DBS, the largest financial services operator in Singapore, is on track to expand its Bitcoin trading services to its retail customers, a wildly divergent position from its plans when it made its debut into the nascent digital currency world.

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In the last quarterly earnings call from the bank, Piyush Gupta, the CEO, noted that the bank is exploring avenues to expand its investor base beyond the professionals allowed to trade BTC on its platform.

“We’ve started doing the work on seeing how we get in a sensible way, take it out, and expand it beyond the current investor base. And that includes making sure we appropriate thinking about things like potential fraud and others,” Gupta said when asked whether DBS Bank has a roadmap for rolling out digital asset trading to retail investors.

Background works must be put in place to provide retail trading services, especially when it is in a highly volatile industry like cryptocurrencies. Gupta submitted that the bank plans to offer the retail services in as much of a decentralized manner as possible. 

In all, DBS bank plans to “make the access to the digital assets a lot more convenient” by enabling instant online deposits and transactions without relying much on banking intermediaries.

“What happens is that you’ve got 24/7, but the customers still need to call and speak to bankers. So the first order is to make it all online, make it self-service, make it instant, and make sure the internal processes are robust to be able to support that,” the CEO added in the earnings call.

It is not uncommon to find traditional banks wading into the digital currency ecosystem. Based on the volatility of crypto and the regulation of banks, the pioneering financial services provider are often known to restrict the trading of coins by retailers or customers that are not classified as high net worth individuals. With DBS planning these pushes, finding others to follow will not come as a surprise.

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Singapore-Based DBS Bank Joins Hedera Hashgraph’s Governing Council

by Blockchain News

Singapore-based multinational banking giant DBS bank has joined the Hedera Governing Council, marking another major embrace of blockchain technology by a mainstream player in finance.

As announced by the Hedera Protocol, DBS breaks the record for being the first and only bank in Southeast Asia to join the governing council and will help Hedera to focus on more innovative ways to revolutionise the world of banking.

“DBS is pleased to join some of the world’s most established organisations on the Hedera Governing Council as we collectively seek to uncover the vast potential of blockchain and distributed ledger technologies,” said Jimmy Ng, Group Chief Information Officer and Head of Technology & Operations at DBS.

“We have been leveraging emerging technologies to reshape the future of banking and have in recent months brought to market a number of innovative offerings powered by blockchain to help our clients seize opportunities in the new normal.” 

DBS now joins 39 other major players across the tech, corporate, non-profit, and academia in the Hedera Governing Council. Amongst the prominent names include IBM, Google, LG Electronics, and the University of London. DBS’s emergence will enable the bank to build on the capabilities of the Hedera protocol to advance its cross-border initiatives, as well as its broad tokenisation advances. As a formal member of the council, DBS will contribute to keeping the protocol decentralised, a development that brings stability and security to all network users.

While the digital currency ecosystem has gained increased prominence all year long with the influx of institutional investors, there is still a focus on the utilities of blockchain protocols. Hedera Hashgraph is an enterprise-grade Proof-of-Stake public ledger for the decentralised economy. The protocol enables developers to build cheap, scalable, and fast applications that can provide power innovations in all aspects that technology can revamp.

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DBS Bank Gets Approval from the Monetary Authority of Singapore to Provide Crypto Payment Services

by Blockchain News

Singapore-based DBS Bank has officially received approval from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to provide cryptocurrency payment services.

The Digital Exchange (DDEx) would start 24/7 operation following Monday to meet the ever-increasing customer demand and high transaction volume.

The company stated that its brokerage division DBS Vickers (DBSV), has obtained regulatory approval in principle under the Payment Services Act (PS Act) that can serve as a major payment institution to provide asset managers and companies and other investors with transactions in digital tokens platform.

The Group Head of Capital Markets at DBS, Eng-Kwok Seat Moey, said the company is pleased to have made steady progress on the digital asset ecosystem in the six months since the DDEx launched last year, which shows in trading and custody activities:

“We have seen keen interest among asset managers and corporates for access to digital payment token services, and with DBSV receiving in-principle approval under the PS Act, we are well-placed to meet this growing demand. This could add to DDEx’s volumes in the coming months, and, coupled with DDEx going operational round the clock, help accelerate growth for DDEx.”

DBS said it is confident of doubling its investors base by the end of the year by providing integrated solutions across the digital asset value chain, notably in the form of STOs, leveraging DBS’ expertise in deal origination to tokenisation, listing, distribution, trading, and custody. 

DBS Digital Exchange (DDEx) was launched in December 2020, aiming to use blockchain technology to provide institutional customers with a safe and transparent comprehensive digital asset ecosystem trading platform including Bitcoin(BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Ripple(XRP), and other well-known trading currencies.

As reported by Blockchain.News on May 31, DBS bank-issued digital bonds with a maturity of 6 months and an annualised coupon rate of 0.6% worth 15 million SGD (US$11.3 million) in its first security token offering (STO) through its Digital Exchange (DDEx).

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Singapore’s DBS Bank launches digital bond security token

by Cointelegraph

Singapore-based multinational banking corporation, DBS Bank, has launched its first-ever security token offering, or STO, by issuing a digital bond.

The DBS digital bond has been priced at $11.35 million and comes with a six-month tenor and coupon rate of 0.60% annually. The offering was carried out through a private placement hosted by DBS Digital Exchange, or DDEx, marking DDEx’s first STO.

To encourage investor engagement, the bond is set to be traded in board lots of 10,000 Singapore dollars (roughly $7,560) — a dramatic reduction compared to the 250,000 Singapore dollar board lots that traditional wholesale bonds are traded in.

The digital bonds will be available for secondary trading to clients of DDEx who are accredited or institutional investors.

DBS hopes its offering will pave the way for other issuers to launch security token offerings via the DDEx platform.

Eng-Kwok Seat Moey, the Group Head of capital markets at DBS, emphasized that security tokens offer an efficient and innovative method for raising capital in the Asia-Pacific region — which currency represents more than 30% of the global private equity markets. He stated:

“Our maiden STO listing on the DBS Digital Exchange is a significant milestone, as it highlights the strength of our digital asset ecosystem in facilitating new ways of unlocking value for issuers and investors. We expect asset tokenisation to increasingly become more mainstream as more of our clients start to embrace security token issuance as part of their capital fund raising.”

Since launching in December 2020, Moey estimates daily volumes on DDEx have increased by 900%, with the platform now servicing more than 120 traders. DBS’s crypto custody service also holds more than $60 million in assets.

The bank also launched a trust structure offering investment management services for Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), XRP, and Bitcoin Cash (BCH) speculators in early May.