Overview
- Morgan Stanley applied to the OCC to form Morgan Stanley Digital Trust, National Association, a federally chartered entity focused on crypto custody, token transactions, and fiduciary staking.
- Citi said it will launch institutional Bitcoin custody later this year, holding clients’ native BTC on balance sheet and operating with unified tax, reporting, and risk frameworks.
- Both banks detailed plumbing to integrate crypto into core systems, with Citi routing instructions via SWIFT and APIs and preparing for round‑the‑clock settlement to match Bitcoin’s 24/7 market.
- Morgan Stanley will first enable E*TRADE clients to trade spot crypto via a partnership, then pursue an in‑house custody and exchange stack targeted over roughly the next year.
- Yield and lending products are under exploration at Morgan Stanley, with executives emphasizing early design stages and no firm timeline, while the firm has also filed for Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana exchange‑traded products.