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Morgan Stanley’s new crypto research team features Sheena Shah at its head, while large traditional financial institutions continue their push into the crypto space.
The financial services giant and investment bank Morgan Stanley announced a new crypto research team. In addition, the firm announced Sheen Shah as the head of that team.
Morgan Stanley said Sheena Shah will lead a new team that researches cryptocurrencies. This comes as many major Wall Street companies continue their push into the digital assets’ arena.
In their announcement, company representatives David Adelman, Juliet Estridge, and Vishy Tirupattur said this step recognizes crypto’s growing presence. “The launch of dedicated crypto research is in recognition of the growing significance of cryptocurrencies and other digital assets in global markets.”
Shah’s role has her as the lead analyst for the new crypto research team. Their research will analyze the impact of cryptocurrencies on equities and fixed income around the world. The team plans a London headquarters and reports to James Faucette and locally to Adam Wood. Faucette and Wood both head fintech and payment research teams from Morgan Stanley in the U.S. and Europe.
In addition, Shah heads Group of 10, a foreign exchange strategy for Europe. Previously she conducted research on crypto for Morgan Stanley, so the news comes as an extra benefit to the partnership.
Crypto and traditional finance
Rather than combating or denying new digital asset trends, the giants of traditional finance are on board with them. The partnerships created with traditional financial institutions create more tangible use cases for crypto and the mainstream masses.
Prior to the creation of their research team, Morgan Stanley dipped its toes in the crypto industry. Earlier this summer, SEC records revealed major holdings from Morgan Stanley in Grayscale Trust. According to the report, the investment bank firm holds 28,000 Grayscale bitcoin trust shares. Around the same time this news surfaced, the company also invested $48 million in the blockchain startup Securitize.
Along with Morgan Stanley other major banks like Bank of America have crypto research teams. Around the same time BoA allowed select clients the ability for BTC futures trading. It’s only traditional banks which take interest in crypto developments.
Financial payment services behemoth Visa continues its crypto-forward developments. This summer it launched a crypto rewards system.