Singapore’s DBS to set up its own digital exchange

Singaporean banking and financial services firm DBS said it plans to set up a members-only digital exchange to help both institutional and accredited investors tap into fully integrated tokenization and digital asset trading.

Loh Boon Chye(left), CEO of Singapore Exchange, and Piyush Gupta, CEO of DBS / Photo credit: DBS

With the DBS Digital Exchange, the company said it aims to provide an ecosystem for fundraising through asset tokenization and secondary trading of digital assets such as cryptocurrencies.

The ecosystem would include a regulated platform for the issuance and trading of digital tokens – a unit of cryptographic information that is used to facilitate real-world transaction – backed by financial assets, according to a statement. It would also feature a digital currency exchange, which will facilitate exchanges from fiat currencies – a government-issued currency that isn’t backed by a commodity such as gold – to cryptocurrencies and vice versa.

The DBS Digital Exchange is also set to introduce a solution for digital custody, or the safekeeping of cryptographic keys that control digital assets, to meet the increasing demand for secure custodial services.

“The exponential pace of asset digitalization provides immense opportunities to reshape capital markets,” said DBS group CEO Piyush Gupta. “For Singapore to become even more competitive as a global financial hub, we have to prepare ourselves to welcome the mainstream adoption of digital assets and currency trading.”

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According to the statement, the Singapore Exchange will take a 10% stake in the DBS Digital Exchange and explore opportunities with the financial services company to drive the growth of the city-state’s capital markets in the growing area of digital assets.