The official news gathered from the three times in a row, ‘Best Bank in the World’ according to Global Finance, the DBS Bank of Singapore has officially announced the launch of its digital assets exchange which will begin trading from next week. The digital exchange is co-owned by Singapore Exchange(SGX) and is tasked with the provision of tokenized securities and other assets, and also to ensure that digital assets get bank-grade custody. Surprisingly, the news is coming in the same week where the Swiss digital exchange SDX confirmed that it would be building a crypto exchange in Singapore with Japan’s SBI Holdings in 2022.

DBS will be the first outfit to receive a financial institution backing

In a media call last Wednesday, Piyush Gupta, DBS Group CEO concedes that the Digital Exchange would be the first cryptocurrency exchange which will receive full backing from a traditional bank and that the new exchange will support exchanges and trade between local currencies and cryptocurrency. In the call, Gupta revealed that in the initial launch of the exchange, it would trade four fiat currencies; US dollars(USD), Hong Kong dollars(HKD), Singapore dollars(SGD) and Japanese Yen(JPY) against four cryptocurrencies; Bitcoin, Ether, Bitcoin Cash and XRP.

He also joked that anything could be tokenized on the platform, even a painting, but the firm is putting its focus on financial assets for now. Loh Boon Chye, CEO of SGX also revealed the excitement of the nation’s exchange in the new development and believes that there are significant opportunities to bring trust and efficiency in price discovery to the global digital assets space and he anticipates working closely with DBS to advance Singapore’s standing as a multi-asset international financial centre.

Gupta says the platform is ready to begin trading

The part of the exchange which handles security token offering will consist of a regulated platform for the issuance and trading of digital tokens backed by financial assets, such as shares in unlisted companies, bonds and private equity funds. Gupta also confirmed that they are ready to begin operation, albeit it will take a month or two to get started with security token offering.

Gupta also spoke about custody which is expected to bank and institution grade. “The custody is expected to be air-gripped old storage that leverages all the existing cybersecurity tech at the bank”, Gupta confirms. He further went on to say that the DBS exchange will cater to institutional clients and accredited investors.

DBS is a leading financial services group in Asia with a presence in 18 markets. Headquartered and listed in Singapore, DBS is in the three key Asian axes of growth: Greater China, Southeast Asia and South Asia. It currently boasts of providing a full range of services in consumer, SME and corporate banking.