The new service will feature crypto accounts alongside bank customers’ other accounts and will not require additional Know Your Customer procedures
Deutsche WertpapierService Bank (Dwpbank) that is engaged in providing securities processing to nearly 1,200 banks across Germany, is creating a new platform, wpNex, which will offer Bitcoin (BTC) to retail customers of its affiliates in H2 of this year.
The new service will feature crypto accounts apart from other accounts of bank customers and will not need additional Know Your Customer (KYC) procedures, as per local media reports.
Wallet-as-a-service (Waas) provider Tangany and Bankhaus Scheich’s Tradias digital asset trading service will also take part in the new offering. Retail customers will not hold private keys. Deutsche WertpapierService Bank CEO Heiko Beck said the bank intended to include other crypto currencies, digital assets and tokenized securities to the service in the future.
MLB Banking was the first Deutsche WertpapierService Bank affiliate to sign on to the platform and has already carried out a transaction on it. The head of account and securities processing at MLP Banking, Paul Utzat, said in a statement: In the MLP customer portal, it is a logical inclusion to the existing wealth management offering.
Crypto accounts are connected to euro cash accounts, therefore transactions can occur without going through a separate payments account.
Germany has been declared one of the world’s most favourable countries for crypto. DZ Bank declared in February that it was including crypto to its asset management service. DZ Bank is the second-biggest bank in Germany in terms of assets and a central institution for a network of bank coops with 8,500 branch offices.
German crypto bank Nuri, though, shut down in November due to pressure of the crypto bear market. It had half a million customers. On the conventional finance side, Deutsche Bank shares plunged on March 24 as uncertainty spread among European banks.
