State Street has announced a strategic agreement with digital currency custody and tokenisation specialist Taurus SA to deliver digital asset capabilities for State Street Bank and Trust Company clients.
According to the global firm, the partnership will further enhance State Street’s Digital Asset Solutions arm, which seeks to provide an integrated business and operating model that supports the digital investment life cycle.
Explaining how it will employ Taurus’ capabilities – which specialise in serving large financial institutions – State Street said it will have access to Taurus’ fully integrated, custody, tokenisation, and node-management solutions to automate the issuance and servicing of digital assets, including digital securities and fund management vehicles, in accordance with applicable institutional standards.
Specifically, State Street will leverage three of Taurus’ products, including Taurus-PROTECT, Taurus-CAPITAL, which streamlines the process of creating and managing tokenised assets throughout their life cycle, and Taurus-EXPLORER, which provides blockchain connectivity to dozens of different blockchain protocols.
“The collaboration with Taurus underscores our ongoing commitment to further establishing ourselves as leaders in this growing asset class, and this important announcement only enhances our ambition to deliver to our clients an amazing digital asset experience,” said Donna Milrod, State Street’s chief product officer and head of Digital Asset Solutions.
“We are excited to be working with Taurus as we continue to elevate our digital asset capabilities and deliver the innovative solutions our clients have been seeking,” Milrod said.
“We are thrilled to have been chosen by State Street as a strategic partner for custody and tokenisation and are excited about our collaboration and the opportunity to introduce innovative digital asset products and services to the industry,” said Lamine Brahimi, co-founder and managing partner of Taurus.
State Street clarified that the collaboration comes at a time of heightened institutional interest in digital assets.
In a market outlook this month, State Street Digital’s head of legal, Justin McCormack, said 2024 has seen significant growth in blockchain-based financial services, along with a global shift in consistency on regulating tokenised assets.
“What’s more, this activity is primed to continue,” McCormack said.
“Regulators appear to view the tokenisation of traditional assets as having the potential to enhance and improve the efficiency of existing financial markets. This differs from the more sceptical and fractured regulatory approach to cryptocurrencies and other entirely new asset classes that tend to exist on decentralised networks with fewer regulatory precedents.”
The bottom line, McCormack clarified, is that there’s good reason for institutional investors globally to expect near-term progress on consistent rules governing asset tokenisation.
“It appears that for now, at least, regulatory focus on cryptocurrencies and the like may have to take a back seat to tokenisation.”
