Fidelity Clearing Canada has successfully secured the green light from the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada, to establish a new Bitcoin (BTC) trading and custody platform. 

Specifically, the trading platform reportedly aims to roll out facilitating features dedicated to institutional investors – nominally pension funds, portfolio managers, and mutual funds – and would mark a new milestone of the first-of-its-kind released in Canada. 

The company additionally has plans down its pipeline to offer support to retail investors, via its regulatory filing for Bitcoin exchange-traded funds and mutual funds, where the submission was finalized in November 2021. 

As of September, Fidelity is reportedly providing management for an overall figure of $4.2 trillion in assets throughout the globe. 

Furthermore, exchange-traded cryptocurrency products are increasingly gathering significant attention, with over 40 such instruments queuing in the waitlist to acquire the regulatory go-ahead from the US regulators alone. 

“The demand for investing in digital assets is growing considerably and institutional investors have been looking for a regulated dealer platform to access this asset class.” Scott Mackenzie, president of Fidelity Clearing Canada, reportedly delivered his remarks via an interview with the Globe and Mail. 

Canada’s journey to crypto adoption has reportedly seen some significant bumps in the road compared to initial expectations. 

Two years ago, QuadrigaCX – the top-tier crypto exchange of the nation at the time – reportedly went out of business following the sudden and mysterious death of its co-founder, Gerald Cotten, which led to the loss of access to funds safely kept in cold wallets.