Zodia Custody, an “institution-first” digital asset custodian whose shareholders include Standard Chartered, SBI Holdings and Northern Trust, has appointed James Harris as Chief Commercial Officer.
Harris joins the business from CCData, “where he was the Commercial Director for the digital asset data company.”
Harris’ appointment comes as Zodia Custody “targets continued global growth, as highlighted by the firm’s most recent launch in Singapore.”
Harris will be responsible “for driving commercial opportunities across the global business, and will be based at the firm’s headquarters in London.” Harris will report “to Zodia Custody CEO, Julian Sawyer.”
James Harris, CCO of Zodia Custody, said:
“The digital asset world is the most innovative and exciting space in financial services. It’s not often that we get to build a financial system from the ground up—yet our work with institutions is doing exactly that. We are creating an entirely new ecosystem for institutions to really seize the advantages digital assets offer, and I look forward to working with Julian and the team to not just bring our products to institutions across the world, but to build the infrastructure of the future.”
Prior to his previous role at CCData, Harris “was Head of Sales at MetaVault and Head of Custody at Diginex.” He also “co-founded Altairian, and had previously worked as a Director at Standard Chartered.”
Julian Sawyer, CEO, Zodia Custody, said:
“James is exactly the right fit for our business. He doesn’t just know our world in detail, he firmly believes in our mission and vision. James also embarks on this journey at an incredibly interesting time, as we leverage the work and partnerships we have achieved this year to develop our solutions across the world.”
As covered last month, Zodia Custody partnered with OpenEden, a compliance-first partner that connects real-world yield opportunities with on-chain assets through its innovative platform that “integrates well understood regulated structures with the efficiency of on-chain infrastructure.”
As part of “Zodia Custody Yield”, which includes staking, this partnership “represents an opportunity for institutions to access off-chain yield potential for their on-chain assets – without compromising on the bank-grade security of Zodia Custody’s platform.”
This partnership responds to investor need “for an institutional-grade custody solution for digital asset products that are low-risk, liquid, and transparent with respect to how returns are generated for stablecoin holders.”