JPMorgan gives retail clients access to Grayscale products

JPMorgan became the first large bank to offer access to cryptocurrencies to retail clients. It doubles its share of the crypto market.

JPMorgan expands access to cryptocurrencies

The American investment bank has given all its asset management clients access to trading in cryptocurrencies, the daily Insider reported on Thursday. It is the first large American bank to allow all its retail wealth clients to gain exposure to cryptocurrencies.

Like several other leading investment banks, JPMorgan previously provided access to crypto products only to its wealthiest clients. The company started taking significant steps to adopt cryptocurrencies at the beginning of this year in connection with the growing demand among institutional investors. The bank recently supported the allocation of a 1% BTC portfolio and shared its belief in the future of ETH staking.

The bank has now allowed advisors to trade in five crypto products, including four from digital asset giant Grayscale Investments. Unnamed sources said JPMorgan sent a memorandum to advisors earlier this week confirming that they could have access to Grayscale’s BTC Trust, Bitcoin Cash Trust, ETH Trust and ETH Classic Trust, and Osprey Funds’ BTC Trust.

Only at the request of clients

The update allegedly concerns clients using the Chase business application, rich clients whose funds are supervised by JPMorgan Advisors, and the richest clients, which are managed by the private bank JPMorgan.

It is noteworthy that consultants will not be allowed to recommend crypto products and will only be allowed to conduct transactions based on client requests, the source said.

Although JPMorgan is the first major investment bank to give all its advisers the green light to trade in crypto products, it is one of the few to move towards the adoption of this asset class in recent months. Competitors such as Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs offer similar crypto products to their wealthiest clients, with Goldman recently revealing that more than half of its clients are investing in or interested in the space. The investment bank is particularly optimistic about Ethereum, claiming that it has the “highest potential for real use” of all cryptoactive assets.

Conclusion

It is interesting to see how, on the one hand, cryptocurrencies are almost banned and elsewhere crypto products are allowed.