Some of Germany's largest banks are set to enter the crypto market with fully regulated custody and trading services.
Deutsche Bank, Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe, and Volksbanken Raiffeisenbanken are building platforms aimed at institutional and retail clients, signalling a significant shift for conservative institutions.
These developments follow the EU's Markets in Crypto‑Assets Regulation (MiCA), which took effect in 2025 and provides clear legal frameworks across Europe.
Deutsche Bank is developing an institutional crypto custody service with Bitpanda and Taurus compliant with BaFin and MiCA regulations. Meanwhile, Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe plans to embed retail crypto trading within its Sparkasse app, reaching nearly 50 million users by mid-2026.
Volksbanken Raiffeisenbanken are piloting compliant trading and custody services through collaborations with Borse Stuttgart Digital and Atruvia.
Deutsche Bank is also developing Project DAMA 2, an Ethereum layer-2 solution for tokenising assets and future bank-issued stablecoins. As major banks adopt crypto, Germany could lead an EU-wide shift to regulated digital assets, ending crypto's unregulated early phase.
