Fifth Largest Swiss Bank Offers Crypto Trading and Custody Services

• PostFinance allows its customers to trade Bitcoin by 2024.
• Last year, revenues from Swissqoute crypto trading services were over $103 million.

The Swiss Post Office has announced plans to expand its cryptocurrency offering by launching a trading and custody service through its banking arm PostFinance. Despite the volatile cryptocurrency market, PostFinance is prepared to offer crypto services directly to its consumers through the bank by 2024.

Following rising consumer demand, the banking arm of the Swiss Post Office, the fifth-largest retail bank in Switzerland, will allow it’s over two million customers to purchase, sell and retain cryptocurrencies by 2024. 

Head of PostFinance retail banking Sandra Lienhart said;

Our clients want direct access to this market through their house bank. Given the growing institutionalization [of cryptocurrencies] in the last 18 months, this is the ideal time to enter the market.

Postfinance already provides clients with exposure to cryptocurrencies through its online application Yuh. This product largely draws from a partnership with Swissquote, which in 2017 became the first Swiss bank to provide cryptocurrency trading to retail customers.

Last year, revenues from Swissquote cryptocurrency trading services were over $103 million, making up an ever-larger slice of profits at the bank. However, the Swiss PostFinance joins the list of other traditional banks that have accepted cryptocurrency, including Julius Baer, LGT Bank, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and Fidelity.

The important part of achieving that investing in cryptocurrencies is essential despite the ongoing winter, which has seen the value of assets like Bitcoin drop by about 70% from its all-time high of $68,789 in November 2021.