CryptoSlate
Grayscale amended its proposed Hyperliquid ETF filing on April 20 and named Anchorage Digital Bank as custodian in place of Coinbase, a switch that looks small on its own but lands inside a market where roughly 80% of US spot Bitcoin ETF AUM still runs through Coinbase in some custody role. As of April 8, the US spot Bitcoin ETF complex held $91.71 billion in assets under management, according to CryptoSlate data, and funds naming Coinbase as custodian or primary custodian account for about $77.10 billion — 84.1% of that total. A stricter measure that excludes multi-custodian setups still leaves roughly $74.06 billion, or 80.8%, tied to Coinbase in some form.
Why it matters
Coinbase became the default crypto ETF custodian for practical reasons — a recognizable compliance profile, institutional operating history, and an infrastructure stack that already looked credible to boards, auditors, market makers, and regulators when spot products won approval in January 2024. Once the largest issuers chose it, the rest of the market inherited a strong template effect: Morgan Stanley's March filing for its proposed Bitcoin ETP, which later launched as the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust, named Coinbase Custody and BNY as custodians, extending the same backbone to another blue-chip entrant. Coinbase's own regulatory position has also deepened — on April 2, the company said it received conditional OCC approval to charter Coinbase National Trust Company, a federal trust framework that gives the custody business underneath products like ETFs a cleaner supervisory map.
Anchorage brings a different profile: it's the first federally chartered crypto-native bank in the US and has been moving deeper into the institutional stack. Grayscale had already used Anchorage as a secondary custodian for part of its Bitcoin and Ethereum trusts, and BlackRock added Anchorage in April 2025 to support its spot crypto ETFs.
Frequently asked questions
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Why did Grayscale switch the Hyperliquid ETF custodian from Coinbase to Anchorage?
Grayscale amended its proposed Hyperliquid ETF filing on April 20 and named Anchorage Digital Bank as custodian in place of Coinbase. Hyperliquid is a newer, more politically sensitive product than a plain spot Bitcoin ETF, and its US-ring-fenced perpetuals venue may have given Grayscale an extra reason to lean on a…
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How concentrated is Coinbase in US spot Bitcoin ETF custody?
As of April 8, funds naming Coinbase as custodian or primary custodian account for about $77.10B of the $91.71B US spot Bitcoin ETF complex — roughly 84.1%. A stricter measure excluding multi-custodian arrangements still leaves about $74.06B (80.8%) tied to Coinbase in some form.
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Why did Coinbase become the dominant crypto ETF custodian in the first place?
Issuers needed a provider with a recognizable compliance profile, institutional operating history, and an infrastructure stack that looked credible to boards, auditors, market makers, and regulators when spot products won approval in January 2024. The largest issuers chose Coinbase, and the rest of the market…
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What makes Anchorage Digital a different kind of crypto custodian?
Anchorage is the first federally chartered crypto-native bank in the US and has been moving deeper into the institutional stack. Grayscale had already used it as a secondary custodian for part of its Bitcoin and Ethereum trusts, and BlackRock added Anchorage in April 2025 to support its spot crypto ETFs.
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Does this filing mark the start of a broader custody migration away from Coinbase?
One filing does not establish a trend, and the market should not turn one amendment into a sweeping break. Even so, custody choices inside ETFs carry informational value because issuers, lawyers, and boards tend to repeat the safest available template — so when a market that has spent years making the same custody…
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