Fidelity Investments revealed at the Block FS conference in New York that it’s looking to expand its institutional cryptocurrency asset platform to now include trading services for the top five to seven cryptocurrencies by market capitalization. A question from CoinDesk, directed to head of Fidelity Digital Assets Tom Jessop, provoked the conversation regarding what other cryptocurrencies may be added to the platform, which is expected to be launched next year.
“I think there is demand for the next four or five in rank of market cap order. So we will be looking at that,” he said.
Jessop further explained Fidelity is utilizing a customer-driven approach for now. In addition, its more than 13,000 institutional clients are “interested in bitcoin and ether because they make up a large part of the current market cap,” CoinDesk reports.
“I think when it comes to security tokens or tokens that are likely to be deemed securities, we are waiting for that space to develop,” he explained. “We have had some interest but we don’t think it’s a groundswell of interest, so our focus is really on the top, call it five-seven, before we start building capabilities for the tail. But I think it will come.”
Fidelity spent four to five years of R&D in the space, while having a long view of the crypto asset class, as well as the underlying technology’s potential, in which Jessop compared to the “exponential sweep of the internet.”
Furthermore, he acknowledged that digital assets may not have had the best results this year – reminding those that a year prior, the run-up in prices saw Fidelity’s charitable crypto donations vehicle garner nearly $70 million in contributions.
“It was a great story and a great source of donations,” Jessop added.