BCG study says banks' custody model choice may shape which crypto services they can offer

what happened

NewsBTC reports that a Boston Consulting Group study, commissioned by Ripple and released on October 22, treats custody as a core element of banks' digital asset planning. The authors estimate that over 30% of crypto assets held outside centralized exchanges sit with institutional custody models. That figure does not mean third-party custodians control 30% of the whole crypto market.

BCG describes several custody models, from enterprise self-custody to wallet-as-a-service, and suggests banks may combine them depending on planned services. An illustrative calculation puts the modeled upside for a regional bank with $200 billion to $300 billion in assets at $80 million to $100 million, if it pairs custody with five use cases. That is a modeled figure, not reported earnings.

why it matters

For markets, the takeaway is that custody affects business design as well as security, since it determines who can instruct payments, how limits apply and how operations run. Ripple sells custody infrastructure and sponsored the research, so its conclusions carry a commercial interest. US regulators reminded banks in July 2025 that crypto safekeeping must meet existing safety and legal requirements. Banks should judge a service by its profit after operating costs and risks.

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