Kingdom Trust says it is qualified under US financial regulations to hold assets on behalf of investment advisers, securities brokers, and retirement plans, according to its website. The company provides storage services for over 30 digital assets, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, Ripple and ZCash, the company said.
The company declined to comment on the identity of the insurer that underwrote Kingdom Trust’s coverage through the Lloyd’s marketplace or the policy’s cost and specific terms. But Kingdom Trust received a “drastic discount” because of its technology, a type of “cold storage,” in which digital coins are stored offline.
Most insurers in the cryptocurrency market avoid coverage for coins kept online, or in “hot storage,” because of high risk of hacking and will only cover offline “cold storage,” which is also generally preferred by cryptocurrency companies. The move by Kingdom Trust, which has USD 12 billion in assets, is the latest example of a once-reticent insurance industry stepping up to offer protection to companies that store cryptocurrency, a volatile and loosely regulated, but rapidly growing business.
Still, a spokesman for Lloyd’s, the world’s largest insurance marketplace, declined to comment for Reuters on the news.
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