Key Takeaways
- • Europe's MiCA-licensed crypto custodians rose more than fourfold over the past year, from 50 to 230, according to Tiger Research.
- • Custody fees scale with assets held, which limits growth, so custodians are moving into trust services to manage and invest client assets and raise profitability.
- • Anchorage and BitGo are expanding into stablecoin issuance and settlement, while Agora and Catena are pursuing investment advisory and asset management, with all four using or seeking national trust bank charters.
- • Anchorage converted to a national trust bank in January 2021 and BitGo in December 2025, both supervised by the OCC.
- • Tiger Research argues custodian competitiveness will depend less on assets held than on the additional services offered to clients.
Summary
Digital asset custody has expanded quickly, according to a Tiger Research report. The number of custodians licensed under the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) in Europe rose from 50 to 230 over the past year. Large global institutions are also entering: Standard Chartered acquired a specialist custody firm, and Citigroup announced plans to enter the market within the year. The report cites RWA.xyz data showing tokenized real-world assets grew 85% this year to about $39.8 billion, and stablecoins grew more than 50% in 2025 to pass $300 billion and have held near that level since. Both asset classes require custody, driving demand.
The report distinguishes custody, in which the client remains owner and the custodian provides safekeeping, from trust services, in which a trustee manages, invests and disposes of assets under a legal duty to the beneficiary. Because custody fees are proportional to assets held, providers are looking to trust services to improve profitability. Tiger Research draws historical parallels to safe deposit companies in Boston and Rochester, which added trust powers to administer estates and manage bond collateral, and to State Street, which moved from custody for the first US mutual fund in 1924 to asset management in 1978 and launched SPY, the first US ETF, in 1993 with the American Stock Exchange.
In digital assets, Anchorage and BitGo are following a similar path. Anchorage converted from a state-chartered trust company to a national trust bank in January 2021, and BitGo did so in December 2025, both under OCC supervision. Their businesses have broadened from institutional Bitcoin and Ethereum products to RWA and stablecoins, adding trading, settlement, collateralized lending and staking. Both act directly as stablecoin issuers. Agora and Catena are preparing investment advisory and asset management offerings. The report argues that these firms could compete with traditional banks for institutional digital asset clients, though it characterizes this as a potential trajectory rather than a current outcome.
The report distinguishes custody, in which the client remains owner and the custodian provides safekeeping, from trust services, in which a trustee manages, invests and disposes of assets under a legal duty to the beneficiary. Because custody fees are proportional to assets held, providers are looking to trust services to improve profitability. Tiger Research draws historical parallels to safe deposit companies in Boston and Rochester, which added trust powers to administer estates and manage bond collateral, and to State Street, which moved from custody for the first US mutual fund in 1924 to asset management in 1978 and launched SPY, the first US ETF, in 1993 with the American Stock Exchange.
In digital assets, Anchorage and BitGo are following a similar path. Anchorage converted from a state-chartered trust company to a national trust bank in January 2021, and BitGo did so in December 2025, both under OCC supervision. Their businesses have broadened from institutional Bitcoin and Ethereum products to RWA and stablecoins, adding trading, settlement, collateralized lending and staking. Both act directly as stablecoin issuers. Agora and Catena are preparing investment advisory and asset management offerings. The report argues that these firms could compete with traditional banks for institutional digital asset clients, though it characterizes this as a potential trajectory rather than a current outcome.
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