Crypto-Keen Chinese Giant-Owned 200 YO Bank Lures BTC-Hungry Rich Investors
More than 200-year-old German lender Hauck & Aufhäuser (H&A), owned by the crypto-keen Chinese conglomerate Fosun, about to offer a new product to high-net-worth individuals and professional investors, looking to invest in cryptoassets.
The bank said it is teaming up with the Berlin-based fintech Kapilendo to open a new crypto fund in January. The HAIC Digital Asset Fund I will be directed at institutional clients, investing in various cryptoassets including bitcoin (BTC), ethereum (ETH) and stellar (XLM).
The minimum investment in the fund is set at EUR 200,000 (USD 243,000).
Dr. Holger Sepp, Member of the Board at H&A, was quoted in a statement as saying that the bank has observed that digital assets are increasingly popular with institutional investors. According to the bank, this is a further step toward expanding its range of services in the Asset Servicing division to include “the innovative and future-oriented component of digital assets.”
Its subsidiary Hauck & Aufhäuser Innovative Capital GmbH will manage the fund’s portfolio of digital assets.
H&A could benefit from Germany’s implementation of the 4th European Union anti-money laundering directive which allows banks to serve as crypto custodians. Despite the changes in German regulation that allow the bank to store crypto on its own, H&A has decided to team up with Kapilendo which will act as the fund’s depositary.
The Frankfurt-based bank is a legacy financial institution whose history dates back to 1796. Fosun, the Hong Kong-listed giant with USD 102.6bn in assets (as of December 2019) and companies in the health, finance, and leisure industries, acquired H&A in 2016.
Meanwhile, in 2017, the conglomerate invested into Chinese blockchain startup Onchain and is now also a co-owner of Singapore-based digital asset custodian Onchain Custodian. Both companies were co-founded by Da Hongfei, Founder of NEO, a blockchain developer, ranked 23rd by market capitalization.
Earlier this year, H&A agreed to acquire another German lender, Bankhaus Lampe. Together the two companies employ around 1,400 employees and manage EUR 35bn, per Reuters data.
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