$512-billion asset manager to offer Bitcoin and Ethereum to wealthy clients

• Anchorage plans to store “a significant portion” of Apollo clients’ digital assets following a new partnership.
• Demand for crypto assets in Europe and the US shoots 74 percent despite the grueling crypto winter.

Global private equity firm Apollo Global Management Inc has begun holding cryptocurrencies on behalf of its clients as the drive for institutional adoption of cryptocurrencies surges.

According to a press release on Monday, crypto services by the New York-based firm will be provided through a partnership with Anchorage Digital, the first federally chartered crypto bank in the U.S.

“Anchorage Digital is pleased to share that Apollo (NYSE: APO has chosen Anchorage Digital as a qualified custodian to safely store crypto assets. Anchorage expects to custody a significant portion of the alternative asset manager’s digital asset portfolio.” The release read.

Founded in 1990, Apollo, which has $512 billion in assets under management first ventured into crypto in April this year, announcing a $50 to $100 million investment in blockchain and Web3. The firm also onboarded former JPMorgan executive Christine Moy as its first head of digital assets strategy to “lead digital asset strategy across the firm, exploring more ways to apply blockchain technologies to our business.”

The announcement comes against the backdrop of a plunge in the global crypto market with Bitcoin, the world’s largest crypto asset shedding as much as 70 percent from its all-time of $68,789.63 last November. However, despite the havoc in crypto-related markets, institutional investors continue to dabble with the nascent sector due to the advantages it promises to avail in the future. According to a report by Fidelity Digital Assets, roughly 74 percent of institutional investors from the US and Europe plan to buy digital assets in the future.

“It’s the validation of this incessant drumbeat that [crypto]is here to stay,” said Diogo Mónica, president of Anchorage Digital, “This is a very long-term horizon process and technology, and that for the large institutions, it doesn’t really matter that there is volatility short term.”

According to Mónica, the partnership between Apollo and Anchorage can hopefully “set the bar for how institutions work with regulated digital asset banks like Anchorage to provide custody and other services for their crypto holdings,” he added.

Although it is still unclear what types of crypto assets Apollo plans to custody, it has previously indicated that it was looking beyond Bitcoin to real-world use cases like asset custody, securitizations, and marketplaces. This suggests that it could be planning to hold cryptocurrencies, Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs) as well as other forms of digital assets.