Standard Chartered Signs Binding Deal to Fold Zodia Custody Into Its Securities Services Division
Standard Chartered Signs Binding Deal to Fold Zodia Custody Into Its Securities Services Division #
Standard Chartered has signed definitive agreements to acquire 100% of Zodia Custody, the digital asset custodian the bank’s venture arm helped build, bringing the firm fully in-house about five months after shareholders first accepted the deal.
The transaction, announced Wednesday, will be executed through Standard Chartered I H Limited, which will take complete ownership of Zodia Custody Limited, the parent company of Zodia’s regulated operating entities in Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, Luxembourg and the United Arab Emirates. The deal requires regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions. No financial terms were disclosed.
The signing completes a process that began in May 2026, when Zodia’s shareholders and noteholders accepted Standard Chartered’s non-binding offer. The bank said the roughly five-month gap between acceptance and the signing of binding agreements reflects the complexity of restructuring a multi-jurisdictional digital asset business.
The deal is structured as a split rather than a straightforward absorption. Zodia’s regulated custody operations will move into Standard Chartered’s Financing and Securities Services division, which handles safekeeping and servicing of conventional securities for institutional clients and already runs digital asset custody operations globally. Standard Chartered said the move is intended to consolidate its custody operations and capture revenue and cost synergies.
Zodia’s software and institutional digital asset infrastructure business will not follow the same path. That arm will be carved out into a new independent entity called Zodia Solutions, which will operate under SC Ventures, the bank’s venture and innovation arm. Zodia Solutions is expected to continue supplying bank-grade infrastructure to financial institutions beyond Standard Chartered, backed by a consortium of bank investors that includes existing Zodia Custody shareholders.
Zodia Custody was established in 2020 as a joint venture between SC Ventures and Northern Trust. Over subsequent years SC Ventures built its stake to nearly 70%, with the remaining equity held by Northern Trust alongside SBI Holdings, Emirates NBD and National Australia Bank, a group that marked Zodia out as a bank-focused custody provider rather than a crypto-native operator.
The full acquisition consolidates what had been a fragmented ownership and operating structure. Standard Chartered has been building out its digital asset services across several business lines, and the transaction puts its Securities Services arm in position to compete for institutional custody mandates as regulators in its key markets clarify their frameworks for crypto assets.
Standard Chartered did not give a completion date. The deal requires sign-off from regulators in each jurisdiction where Zodia holds licences.
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