American multinational investment bank Morgan Stanley is reportedly planning to offer clients the chance to trade in Bitcoin derivatives, reports Bloomberg from an anonymous source.
The source, who claims to be close to the matter, shared with Bloomberg that the New York-based bank will be following in the footsteps of other Wall Street firms offering crypto-related services by dealing in contracts that give investors ”synthetic exposure to the performance of Bitcoin“. Investors will be given the option to go long or short using what is described as a ”price return swap”, with Morgan Stanley adding its own charge to each transaction that it facilitates.
Apparently, it is just waiting for enough institutional client demand and final approval for the internal processes to start offering these services, as the bank is already technically prepared for the Bitcoin trading.
While Morgan Stanley does not plan to trade in Bitcoin directly, the proposed services are tied to Bitcoin futures contracts. Any direct Bitcoin trading is unlikely to happen in the near future either, as CEO James Gorman has said customers will not be able to buy and sell directly through the bank.
Gorman has said, however, that the bank intends to build a cryptocurrency trading desk that will support derivatives of various digital currency assets. Andrew Peele, formerly of Credit Suisse Group AG, has been taken on by Morgan Stanley as head of digital asset markets to help institute this.
Goldman Sachs reaffirmed last week that it would not be abandoning its cryptocurrency trading desk, despite fake news report circling in the media. According to the firm’s chief financial officer Martin Chavez, the bank was even looking into expanding its crypto operations by launching a Bitcoin derivative.
Physical Bitcoin is not yet on the cards for Goldman Sachs yet, however, as Chavez explained: ”Physical Bitcoin is something tremendously interesting and tremendously challenging. From the perspective of custody, we don’t yet see an institutional-grade custodial solution for bitcoin, we’re interested in having that exist and it’s a long road.”
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