The first pilot of the proposed service could launch later this year.

Standard Chartered’s venture and innovation arm, SC Ventures, has been working on the development of “one of the most secure crypto custody solutions on the market,” reports CoinDesk.

According to Alex Manson, who heads SC Ventures, the UK-based custody service will be open to institutional clients internationally. It will serve crypto assets such as digital currencies as well as security tokens.

The rationale for the service

According to Manson, more than 20 institutions have shown interest in the SC Ventures solution. In his view, institutional participation in crypto assets has been hindered by the non-availability of suitable and secure custody services. Institutional grade custody is a prerequisite, particularly in the context of the millions of dollars worth of digital assets that such entities would hold.

“If digital assets more broadly are here to stay as an asset class, then you will need the infrastructure to keep them safe,” Manson said to CoinDesk.

METACO, a key technology provider

Manson said METACO, an SC Ventures’ investment, would be one of the key technology providers for the custodial service.

METACO launched SILO, an institutional operating system for digital assets, in 2018.

SILO is a framework for digital asset custody, transaction management, trading, and tokenization. METACO has significant Tier 1 and Tier 2 bank implementations including banks and exchanges regulated by FINMA, BaFin, Banco de España, ECB, and MAS.

METACO raised  $17 million in a Series A funding round earlier this month. SC Ventures participated, alongside Giesecke+Devrient, a provider of central bank infrastructure, and others.

Manson said on the METACO funding: “We believe that digital assets are here to stay as an asset class. However, the infrastructure is still very nascent. We are developing a venture to meet the demands of institutional investors for an end-to-end institutional-grade custodian of digital assets, which meets regulatory standards.”

Institutional interest in crypto is growing according to Grayscale

Cryptocurrency asset manager Grayscale last week reported second-quarter inflows of $905.8 million into its funds. That’s a record and nearly twice the previous record of $503.7 million achieved in the first quarter.

Notably, institutions accounted for 84% of the investment in Grayscale’s crypto funds.

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