January 26, 2026
By Our Correspondent
Swiss bank to offer crypto products to its wealthy clients
UBS is preparing to let selected clients trade Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies, beginning with spot Ether and Bitcoin. Execution and custody partners are still being finalised after months of discussions, and the bank has declined to commit to a full public rollout timetable. The caution is deliberate.
Demand is coming from the top. High-net-worth clients are increasingly asking established banks for regulated access to digital assets, pushing UBS to accommodate crypto within its existing risk and compliance frameworks. Market stability and regulatory clarity remain decisive constraints. The approach favours incremental expansion over rapid scale.
This is not UBSâs first foray into digital assets. In late 2023 it allowed wealthy clients in Hong Kong to trade cryptocurrency-linked exchange-traded funds. A year later it launched UBS Digital Cash, a private blockchain pilot focused on improving cross-border settlement. The bank has also participated in tokenisation trials with Swift and Chainlink. Together, these projects laid the technical groundwork for broader crypto access.
UBS is joining a growing institutional cohort. Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase already offer crypto exposure to select clients, while Standard Chartered enables institutional spot trading in Bitcoin and Ether and is building a crypto prime brokerage. Bank of America, for its part, provides access through regulated vehicles such as Bitcoin ETFs. Morgan Stanley has even filed to offer Bitcoin and Solana ETFs to millions of affluent clients.
The shift challenges the notion that crypto adoption rises and falls with four-year market cycles. For wealth managers, digital assets are increasingly treated as long-term portfolio components rather than speculative trades. Institutional participation now appears less sensitive to price swings.
Timing matters. UBS is still digesting Credit Suisse, a process that includes job cuts across Switzerland, while bracing for tougher capital requirements. Regulatory uncertainty has weighed on the bankâs share price, which management says trades at a discount to peers. With its chief executive, Sergio Ermotti, planning to retire in 2027, adaptability has become a strategic necessity.
Crypto trading, then, is less a leap of faith than another adjustment. For UBS, modernising wealth management may be the surest way to reassure clientsâand investorsâthat the bank can still evolve under pressure.
