Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange by volume traded, enlisted Spain’s third-largest bank, BBVA, to provide custody services as it looks to improve protection for customers by isolating their assets from any disruption that might occur to the trading platform, the Financial Times reported.
The custody arrangement separates trading activities from the funds backing the transactions by parking client assets in U.S. Treasuries held by BBVA. Binance then accepts the Treasuries as margin for trading, the FT said, citing people familiar with the process. If Binance were to fail, funds would remain secure in the Treasuries under BBVA’s control.
The deal distances the exchange from its earlier model of holding user funds in-house. The shift follows mounting pressure on crypto exchanges to isolate custody from trading, especially after FTX’s collapse in 2022, which left users’ funds frozen and shattered confidence across the market. Others measures exchange adopted include proof-of-reserves, a cryptographic method of proving customers’ funds are in their wallets.
Binance, which paid a $4.3 billion penalty last year to U.S. regulators for anti-money laundering failures, has since allowed clients to use third-party custodians including Sygnum and FlowBank.
BBVA has been moving deeper into crypto. Just this year, it rolled out crypto trading and custody services through its mobile app and advised private clients to allocate up to 7% of portfolios into bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH).