Grayscale moves away from Coinbase for new ETF product – Is Wall Street building a post-Coinbase custody map?

The US spot Bitcoin ETF market, now valued at over $91 billion, faces infrastructure challenges despite strong investor demand. Grayscale's recent amendment to its Hyperliquid ETF filing, replacing Coinbase with Anchorage Digital Bank as custodian, highlights a growing consideration for custody diversification among issuers. While this single change doesn't indicate a full migration, it suggests a trend as issuers re-evaluate reliance on a single custodian. Coinbase has dominated crypto ETF custody due to its established compliance, institutional history, and regulatory familiarity, becoming the central operational node for the market. However, this concentration poses risks, including potential single points of failure from outages or regulatory issues. The move by Grayscale, particularly for a product with more regulatory sensitivity, indicates a potential preference for federally chartered custodians like Anchorage, which offers a different institutional profile. As the crypto ETF market matures, the focus is shifting from initial access and legitimacy to resilience, necessitating a broader and more redundant infrastructure beyond the initial dominant template.

(Source：CryptoSlate)