Crypto bank SEBA expands to 9 new markets, including Singapore and Hong Kong

A month after going fully operational, Switzerland-based cryptocurrency bank SEBA has expanded to nine new countries.

In a statement shared with The Block on Thursday, SEBA said companies and institutional clients from Singapore, Hong Kong, the U.K., Italy, Germany, France, Austria, Portugal, and the Netherlands can now open accounts with the bank.

SEBA was set up in April 2018 and received a banking license from the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) in August of this year. “More than 10 years after the invention of Bitcoin, there is still a tremendous gap between traditional banking on one side and decentralized finance on the other side,” said SEBA in Thursday's statement, adding that it aims to bridge the gap.

The bank also offers SEBAwallet app, e-banking, and SEBA card facilities, through which customers can manage five cryptocurrencies - bitcoin (BTC), ether (ETH), Stellar (XLM), litecoin (LTC) and ether classic (ETC), and convert them into traditional currencies and vice versa online. SEBA also provides corporate accounts to Swiss blockchain companies and their employees.

SEBA rival Sygnum also got a banking license in Switzerland in August and went live a month after. Sygnum also recently received a capital markets services license in Singapore, allowing it to provide asset management services in the Asian country.