When a bank managing $30 trillion in client assets says it’s making Bitcoin “bankable,” that’s not marketing language — that’s a structural shift in how the world’s largest financial institutions are positioning themselves. As a Bitcoin maximalist I’ve argued for years that institutional adoption was inevitable. This week Citi confirmed it.
— Etan Hunt, DailyCoinPost
Citigroup announced this week that it plans to launch Bitcoin custody infrastructure later in 2026, integrating the cryptocurrency directly into its core banking systems alongside equities, bonds, and other traditional assets.
The announcement came on February 26th at Strategy World — an institutional conference hosted by Bitcoin treasury firm Strategy — where Nisha Surendran, Citi’s head of digital asset custody development, outlined the bank’s plans in detail. Full coverage of the announcement has been reported by CoinMarketCap, CryptoBriefing, and BanklessTimes.
“Later this year, Citi will be launching our infrastructure that integrates Bitcoin into traditional finance,” Surendran said. “We’re going to start with core custody and safekeeping capabilities, institutional-grade key management, and wallet infrastructure.”
The message was deliberate and unambiguous. Citi’s goal, in Surendran’s own words, is to make Bitcoin bankable.
What Citi Is Actually Building
This is not a crypto trading desk or a Bitcoin ETF wrapper. Citi is building the infrastructure to hold native Bitcoin directly on behalf of institutional clients — the same way it currently holds stocks and bonds — within a unified account structure.
Practically speaking this means:
Bank-grade custody — institutional clients will be able to hold Bitcoin through Citi’s regulated custody framework, with the same safeguards, segregation, and insurance structures applied to traditional securities.
Unified reporting — Bitcoin positions will feed directly into existing tax workflows, compliance systems, and performance reporting. Institutional investors will see their Bitcoin holdings in the same dashboard as their equity and fixed income portfolios.
Swift and API integration — Citi plans to route Bitcoin transactions through its existing instruction channels including Swift messaging and API connections, abstracting away the technical complexity of UTXO management and wallet addresses from institutional clients.
Cross-margining potential — perhaps most significantly, Citi is exploring the ability for clients to pledge Bitcoin as collateral within the same master custody account that holds government bonds or tokenized money market funds. Bitcoin as institutional collateral alongside treasuries is a landmark development.
Three Years in the Making
This announcement did not come out of nowhere. Biswarup Chatterjee, Citi’s global head of partnerships and innovation, confirmed to CNBC last October that the bank had been quietly developing this infrastructure for more than three years. Coinlaw.io and Crypto Economy both confirmed the three-year development timeline in their coverage.
That timeline is significant. Citi began building Bitcoin custody infrastructure in 2022 or 2023 — during the bear market, during the FTX collapse, during the period when mainstream media was writing Bitcoin’s obituary. While retail investors panicked, one of the world’s largest banks was building the rails to integrate Bitcoin into global finance.
The favorable regulatory environment in 2026 — including the passage of the GENIUS Act providing clearer guidance for banks offering digital asset services — has now given Citi the green light to move from development to deployment.
The Scale of What This Means
To understand why this matters you need to understand Citi’s scale. The bank currently manages approximately $30 trillion in client assets across custody, reporting, and transaction services. It operates across more than 220 global payment networks.
When infrastructure of that scale integrates Bitcoin, it doesn’t just give existing Citi clients access to Bitcoin. It changes the risk calculus for every pension fund, sovereign wealth fund, endowment, and asset manager that uses Citi’s custody services globally.
These institutions have historically been unable to hold Bitcoin not because they didn’t want to but because their operational infrastructure — compliance, reporting, custody segregation, insurance — wasn’t built for it. Citi is solving that problem.
Internal surveys at Citi suggest that approximately 10% of total financial market volume could be digital within five years. On a $30 trillion base, that’s $3 trillion in potential digital asset flows through Citi’s infrastructure alone.
Citi Is Not Alone — Wall Street Is Moving Fast
Citi’s announcement came at the same event where Morgan Stanley revealed its own crypto custody and exchange platform. Morgan Stanley plans to initially allow E-Trade clients to buy and sell spot cryptocurrencies, with a fully integrated platform expected within a year.
JPMorgan has already filed for structured notes linked to BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF IBIT, offering investors exposure to Bitcoin-linked returns. BNY Mellon has expanded digital asset custody capabilities.
The pattern is consistent and accelerating. Every major Wall Street institution is building Bitcoin infrastructure simultaneously. The race is no longer about whether to offer Bitcoin services — it’s about who builds the best infrastructure fastest.
The Bitcoin Maximalist Take
I want to be direct about the tension this creates for Bitcoin purists.
Bitcoin was built specifically to remove the need for custodians and intermediaries. The entire premise of the whitepaper — which you can download as a free poster here — is peer-to-peer electronic cash that requires no trusted third party. And now we’re celebrating a $2.5 trillion bank offering to be your Bitcoin custodian.
The criticism is valid. Not your keys, not your coins remains true. Any Bitcoin held in Citi’s custody system is ultimately subject to the same counterparty risk, regulatory seizure, and institutional failure as any other custodied asset.
But here’s the reality: the capital pools that need to move into Bitcoin to drive its next phase of adoption are institutionally managed. Pension funds, endowments, sovereign wealth funds — these entities cannot self-custody. They are legally and operationally required to use regulated custodians. Citi’s infrastructure is the bridge that allows that capital to flow.
The Bitcoin that matters for price discovery and long-term adoption is Bitcoin held by people who understand and believe in it — self-custodied, sovereign, outside the banking system. Citi’s custody offering doesn’t replace that. It adds a parallel track that brings institutional capital into the ecosystem.
More capital chasing 21 million coins is ultimately bullish for every Bitcoin holder regardless of where it’s held.
What This Means for Bitcoin’s Price
Citi’s own analysts projected in December 2025 that Bitcoin could reach $143,000 in 2026 in their base case, with a bullish scenario above $189,000. Those forecasts were made when Bitcoin was trading around $88,000 — it has since pulled back significantly to the current $67,000 range.
The gap between Citi’s price forecast and Bitcoin’s current price is notable. The bank building Bitcoin custody infrastructure while simultaneously forecasting $143,000-$189,000 suggests their conviction in Bitcoin’s trajectory has not changed with the recent correction.
Infrastructure announcements of this scale don’t move prices immediately. The custody service hasn’t launched yet. The institutional flows it enables are months away at minimum. But the direction is clear — the largest financial institutions in the world are building for a Bitcoin future, not against it.
Key Facts Summary
- Who: Citigroup — $2.5 trillion bank, $30 trillion in custody assets
- What: Bank-grade Bitcoin custody, key management, and wallet infrastructure
- When: Later in 2026 — no specific date disclosed
- Announced: February 26, 2026 at Strategy World conference
- Spokesperson: Nisha Surendran, Head of Digital Asset Custody Development
- Development timeline: More than 3 years in progress
- Regulatory context: GENIUS Act passage provided enabling regulatory framework
- Also announced at same event: Morgan Stanley crypto custody and exchange platform
Related reading on DailyCoinPost:
- Bitcoin Bounces Back to $69K — $571M in Shorts Liquidated
- Free Bitcoin Whitepaper Poster — Download & Print
- Submit a Crypto Press Release from $100
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Always conduct your own research before making any investment decisions.
