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Custody Working Group

The ISSA and Global Digital Finance (GDF) Custody Working Group set out to map how digital asset custody (DAC) fits into the overall crypto and digital assets landscape, drawing parallels or comparisons to traditional custody with the aim to allow market actors to understand the DAC business and how critical it is in building digital market infrastructure.

The Working Group, in support of GDF and ISSA’s member firms and the Working Group Secretariat, Deloitte, have produced a report: “Digital Asset Custody Deciphered: A Primer to Navigating the Challenges of Safeguarding Digital Assets”.

This report is a primer to help move the knowledge of DAC forward by bringing to the forefront, the opportunities and barriers DAC providers have to successfully navigate moving to these new digital technologies and ways of working.

 As an additional resource, GDF and ISSA have  compiled the key takeaways from each section in a short auxiliary report. These takeaways condense the key considerations for financial services professionals, investors and policy makers of all experience and levels with a starting point to understand the risks and considerations involved in DAC and equip them to move forward with decisions, solutions, and execution.

The report was published in October 2023 with a press release. The WG and sponsors will evaluate next steps and most suitable course of action for the WG in 2024 based on community feedback on the report.

In Q1 and Q2 2024, GDF will be pursuing its DAC Programme by hosting a series of roundtables on DAC. The aim of these roundtables is to convene industry players to continue to discuss and to bring to the forefront, the opportunities and barriers DAC providers have to successfully navigate moving to these new digital technologies and ways of working, particularly as it pertains to custody of tokenized RWA. These roundtables will additionally help to coordinate by establishing shared challenges, both regulatory and policy based, building relationships, and outlining potential policy and standards related priorities and opportunities in 2024.