Wall Street giant Morgan Stanley reportedly wants to gain a foothold in the cryptocurrency industry by acquiring a stake in Bithumb.
A few days after the news that Morgan Stanley will allow its institutional clients to purchase bitcoin, the giant investment bank has started negotiations to buy a share in the largest cryptocurrency exchange in South Korea – Bithumb.
According to the Asian news website Naver News, Morgan Stanley is the last major traditional financial firm to consider a Bithumb market.
The giant bank plans to acquire a significant stake in the popular cryptocurrency exchange through Bident – an entity that owns 10.3% of Bithumb Korea (the company that operates the exchange).
An anonymous source said Morgan Stanley planned to invest about $300 billion to $500 billion yuan (between $250 million and $440 million).
In addition, the anonymous source said that the multinational bank will use Bident’s services because the latter has the right to “negotiate a preferred sale for the acquisition of Bithumb Holdings”.
It was reported earlier that gaming giant Nexon is also looking to buy a stake. However, the Naver News report claimed that negotiations between Bithumb and Nexon had collapsed.
It seems to be a big week for the connection between Morgan Stanley and the cryptocurrency industry. A few days earlier, an internal note the bank sent to its investors revealed that the foundation plans to allow its customers to buy bitcoin through three investment funds from next month.
