Zodia Custody

Zodia Custody is an institutional digital asset custodian founded by Standard Chartered (through its innovation unit SC Ventures) and Northern Trust, providing cold-wallet-first custody, staking, and curated ecosystem services for financial institutions across 85+ digital assets, including Solana.

Background and Founding

Zodia Custody was established in 2020 as a joint venture between Standard Chartered's SC Ventures and Northern Trust, with the explicit goal of applying traditional banking custody standards to digital assets. The firm launched commercially in 2021 following registration with the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), an approval jointly announced by both founding parents. The FCA registration placed Zodia under supervision under the UK's Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds Regulations.

The founding premise was that institutional investors needed a custodian that understood the conventions of traditional securities custody — segregated accounts, insurance coverage, independent audits — and could apply those disciplines to cryptocurrency. Standard Chartered contributed its 160-year heritage in institutional custody and international banking presence; Northern Trust contributed its deep experience in asset servicing for institutional asset managers.

Over subsequent years, Zodia attracted minority shareholders including SBI Holdings, National Australia Bank, and Emirates NBD, building a multi-region investor base that reflected its geographic ambitions. The company expanded to seven offices across the UK, Europe (Luxembourg, Ireland), the Middle East (UAE), Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore), and Australia, with approximately 147 employees as of recent reporting.

Custody Model and Security Architecture

Zodia Custody's core product is its proprietary custody platform, which it describes as "cold-wallet by design." Unlike platforms that route assets through hot wallets for operational convenience, Zodia's infrastructure keeps digital assets in air-gapped cold storage while maintaining the ability to process transactions in real time without human intervention in the signing flow.

The technical stack layers multiple cryptographic approaches: Multi-Party Computation (MPC), multi-signature protocols, and Shamir's Secret Share schemes, all operating on FIPS 140-2 Level 3 certified Hardware Security Modules (HSMs). Infrastructure runs across geo-redundant data centres to eliminate single points of failure.

On the compliance and assurance side, Zodia holds ISO 27001 certification, has completed SOC 1 Type II and SOC 2 Type I external controls audits, operates a private bug bounty program, and undergoes independent penetration testing. The firm carries insurance coverage exceeding USD 350 million, providing institutional clients with a balance-sheet-backed backstop against loss events.

Products and Services

Core Custody: The foundational offering — segregated cold-wallet storage for 85+ digital assets spanning major cryptocurrencies (BTC, ETH, SOL), stablecoins (USDC, USDT, EURC), tokenized money market funds, and real-world assets. Zodia handles travel-rule compliance via a third-party solution.

Zodia Gateway: An ecosystem layer that curates vetted third-party protocols and service providers, giving institutional clients access to staking, DeFi participation, and other yield activities directly from their custody wallets — without moving assets off-platform or into unvetted environments.

Zodia Rewards: Launched in July 2025, Zodia Rewards is an opt-in token rewards programme for institutional clients. The programme eliminates custody fees and substitutes native reward incentives, with yields reported at up to 500 basis points for eligible stablecoin holdings.

Zodia Switch: Introduced in February 2026 in partnership with LMAX Group, Zodia Switch enables institutional clients to execute asset-to-asset swaps directly from their custodial wallets. The initial asset scope covers ERC-20 assets including ETH, wrapped BTC (WBTC), RLUSD, USDC, and USDT.

Staking: Zodia supports delegated staking for five blockchains: Ethereum (ETH), Polkadot (DOT), Cardano (ADA), BNB Chain (BNB), and Solana (SOL). Staking is accessible via Zodia Gateway, with assets remaining in segregated cold wallets throughout the process.

Regulatory Footprint

Zodia holds a multi-jurisdictional regulatory profile that it markets as a differentiator for financial institution clients operating across regions:

• UK: Registered with the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)
• Ireland: Authorised by the Central Bank of Ireland
• Luxembourg: Licensed by the CSSF as a Crypto-Asset Service Provider (CASP) under MiCA; also holds a Payment Institution licence for stablecoin services
• EU: MiCA passporting rights across EU member states; listed by the French AMF as a MiCA-licensed CASP as of January 2026
• Abu Dhabi (UAE): Regulated by the ADGM Financial Services Regulatory Authority through its Tungsten Custody Solutions subsidiary
• Hong Kong: Holds a Trust or Company Service Provider (TCSP) licence

This breadth of licensing makes Zodia one of the few custodians capable of serving financial institutions with reporting and compliance obligations across UK, EU, and Asian jurisdictions simultaneously.

Solana Ecosystem Fit

Zodia Custody's connection to Solana became concrete in September 2024 when the firm announced a partnership with Marinade Finance to enable institutional SOL staking via Zodia Gateway. The integration allows Zodia clients to connect with Marinade and stake SOL directly from their cold-wallet custody arrangements, without transferring assets to a separate staking account or third-party wallet.

Marinade is a non-custodial stake automation platform on Solana. The partnership is Zodia's fifth blockchain staking integration after ETH, DOT, ADA, and BNB. The appeal for institutional clients is the ability to generate potential rewards on SOL holdings while assets remain in segregated, insured cold storage — a constraint that most liquid staking protocols alone cannot satisfy for regulated entities.

The partnership also contributes to broader institutional adoption of Solana's validator ecosystem, as each institutional client delegating through Zodia Gateway participates in SOL staking distribution across Marinade's validator set.

2026 Acquisition by Standard Chartered

In April 2026, Standard Chartered moved to acquire Zodia Custody outright, with all minority shareholders — Northern Trust, SBI Holdings, National Australia Bank, and Emirates NBD — accepting the non-binding offer. The deal was confirmed in May 2026.

The restructuring takes a dual-track form. Zodia's institutional custody business for Standard Chartered's own clients is being absorbed into the bank's Corporate and Investment Banking division, integrating it into the bank's core regulated infrastructure. Simultaneously, Zodia will continue operating as a standalone software-as-a-service platform — under the Zodia Solutions name — providing white-label digital asset custody technology to third-party financial institutions.

The acquisition reflects Standard Chartered's broader push into digital assets: the bank had already launched its own digital asset custody services from Luxembourg in January 2025. The move also fits a broader trend of custody consolidation, with institutions including BNY Mellon, State Street, and Morgan Stanley expanding digital asset custody capabilities.

For Solana specifically, Zodia's institutional staking infrastructure through the Marinade partnership represents a regulated, bank-backed on-ramp for large financial institutions seeking SOL exposure with the compliance controls, insurance coverage, and audit documentation their mandates require.