custody
Concentration Risk: Holding Everything in One Place
The simplest control available to any holder is also the least used. What splitting across venues actually buys.
Who is holding it, and on what terms
Custody is the part nobody checks until it fails. These notes follow where assets sit, who controls the keys, what the terms actually say, and what happens on the day a withdrawal is refused.
On the list
custody
Staking Through a Custodian: Who Owns the Rewards
Delegating staking to the venue holding your assets adds three exposures that the advertised yield does not mention.
corporate wallet
Multi-Signature Arrangements That Survive an Employee Leaving
Most company multi-signature setups fail on staff turnover rather than on cryptography. Five provisions that prevent it.
licensing
Reading a Terms of Service for the Clause That Matters
Six searches through a terms document that take ten minutes and tell you more than any review.
custody
Operational Risk Beats Hacking Risk, and the Numbers Show It
Attention goes to exploits. Most customer losses have come from mundane failures of process and governance.
licensing
Regulated Custodian Versus Regulated Exchange: Not the Same Thing
Two licences, two sets of obligations, and a difference that only becomes visible when something goes wrong.
offramp
How Quickly Can You Actually Get Your Assets Back
The exposure is a withdrawal process that has never been tested at your size. Four things decide the answer.
licensing
Audit Reports on Custodians: Which Ones Mean Anything
Four kinds of report circulate and they differ enormously in what they examined. How to tell them apart.
corporate wallet
Self-Custody for a Company: The Problems It Creates
Removing counterparty risk introduces operational risk, and for an organisation the second is harder to manage than the first.
corporate wallet
Questions a Business Should Ask Before Leaving Funds Anywhere
Eight questions, answerable in writing, that separate a venue that has thought about custody from one that has not.
custody
A Teardown of One Custody Failure, From First Warning
The composite pattern of how venue failures have unfolded, assembled from the public record of several.
custody
Cold Storage Percentages and Why the Number Moves
The exposure is in the hot portion. What the published percentage means, and what makes it change without announcement.
custody
Third-Party Sub-Custodians Nobody Mentions in Marketing
The exposure is a chain of custody longer than the one disclosed. Your assets may sit two entities away from the venue you chose.
licensing
Bankruptcy and Crypto: Where Customers Rank
The exposure is discovering at the worst moment that your balance was an unsecured claim. What determines the ranking.
custody
The Insurance Line in a Custody Agreement, Read Closely
The exposure is assuming insurance covers your loss. Most policies cover a narrow set of events and a fraction of assets.
custody
Who Signs: Key Management at Custodians, Compared
The exposure is that one person can move everything. Four arrangements, and what each one survives.
offramp
When Withdrawals Pause: The Pattern Before a Failure
Withdrawal problems have preceded nearly every major venue failure. Which ones are routine and which are the signal.
custody
What Proof of Reserves Proves, and What It Leaves Out
The exposure is treating an asset snapshot as a solvency statement. The two differ in three specific ways.
custody
Segregated or Pooled: Reading the Terms That Decide It
Two sentences in the terms of service determine whether your assets are yours in an insolvency. Here is how to find them.
custody
Where Client Assets Actually Sit at a Typical Exchange
The exposure is that your balance is an entry in a database and the assets behind it are held somewhere you have not been told about.