Piyush Gupta, the CEO of DBS Bank announced during the bank’s fourth-quarter earnings call that the bank intends to launch cryptocurrency trading for retail investors this year. Gupta said that in the first half of this year DBS will work on making digital assets very effortlessly accessible. DBS Bank Limited is a Singaporean multinational financial and banking services and the largest bank in Southeast Asia by assets. He added that the new services would launch by the end of 2022.

Gupta was inquired if DBS intends to expand its digital asset exchange and if the roadmap for introducing digital asset trading for retail investors is given in that market. To which the CEO responded that the bank will first concentrate in the first half of this year to make access to digital assets a lot easier. He added that rather than the 24/7 service provided by the banks today, customers still feel the need to call customer care services and speak to bankers. Thus, DBS plans to make all these services online, self-executable, and rapid. This would aid in operating online deposits to operate quicker and more seamlessly with a few intermediaries.

Gupta continued that the bank would ensure that the internal procedures are well-equipped to brace such processes. He added that the bank has also initiated experimenting and working on the ways to come out and expand beyond the accredited investor base in a sensible way. These include the correct approach and mechanism about gauging and suitability potential for fraud.

DBS Bank introduced its crypto exchange DBS Digital exchange in December 2020 supported by SGX, Singapore’s largest derivatives, and asset exchange.