Crypto custodian Anchorage Digital is expanding its services to include custody and staking support for Solana-based tokens.

Anchorage Digital Bank, a federally chartered crypto bank in the U.S., is enhancing its offerings with custody and staking support for the Solana ecosystem. In an August 6 announcement, the custodian confirmed it will now support Solana-based tokens in the SPL standard, in addition to its existing services for Solana’s native token.

Nathan McCauley, co-founder of Anchorage Digital, highlighted the decision was driven by increasing institutional demand for safe and secure access to leading networks like Solana.

Founded in 2017 by Nathan McCauley, Diogo Monica, and Boaz Avital, Anchorage Digital Bank is a crypto custodian that secured backing from investors such as Andreessen Horowitz, Blockchain Capital, and Oaktree Capital Management. In early 2022, the custodian raised $80 million in a Series C funding round led by a16z.

Anchorage Digital’s latest service expansion aims to meet rising institutional demand for access to the Solana ecosystem. The custodian initially added support for SOL custody in 2022 and staking in 2023.

The SPL standard allows startups on the Solana network to issue their own tokens, which can be integrated into various scenarios such as decentralized applications, tokenization, payments, and governance. Similar to Ethereum’s ERC-20 and TRON’s TRC-20 standards, the SPL standard enhances the usability of protocols on the Solana network.

Solana’s recent market activity saw it temporarily surpass Binance Coin (BNB) to become the fourth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization before settling back into the fifth position.

Additionally, Solana outperformed Ethereum in on-chain trading activity on decentralized exchanges during July, boasting $55.8 billion in trading volume.

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