Swiss Arm of Russia's Gazprombank Launches Institutional Bitcoin Offerings

Oct 30, 2020 at 13:13 UTCUpdated Oct 30, 2020 at 13:43 UTC.Gazprombank, a bank from the fold of Russian energy giant Gazprom, is launching institutional cryptocurrency services in Switzerland.

In an announcement Thursday, the regulated Swiss arm of the bank said it has now received authorization from FINMA to launch the new services, initially to a limited number of clients.

Gazprombank will later expand the offerings to more institutional and corporate clients, providing a custody service and bitcoin trading against fiat currencies.

More cryptocurrencies are expected to be added later.

"We expect digital assets to become increasingly important in the global economy and, in particular, for our current and potential clientele," said the bank's CEO, Roman Abdulin.

The bank said it applies "Specially designed" due diligence procedures to add security and ensure compliance with Swiss anti-money laundering and know-your-customer rules.

Gazprombank, Russia's third-largest by net assets, has been mulling a move into cryptocurrency services for some time, saying back in 2018 that it was planning a pilot before starting serve its wealthy clients.

Last year, the bank and its parent firm, Gazprom, also said they had built a blockchain platform for executing business contracts and that it would soon be used digitize the gas supply process.