Santander’s online subsidiary Openbank has started offering crypto services in the country, allowing customers to manage Bitcoin, Ether, Litecoin, Polygon and Cardano directly through its platform.

The move is notable because clients no longer need to use third-party exchanges. Crypto now sits inside the same dashboard as Openbank’s traditional investments, giving users a single portal for stocks, funds, and digital tokens. Santander confirmed that Spain will be next to receive the service, followed by new assets and features such as token swaps.

Behind the decision is a broader European trend: Germany’s financial giants are racing to position themselves in the MiCA era. DZ Bank, for example, already tested crypto access for its cooperative banks last year. Deutsche Bank is working toward custody services scheduled for 2026, and Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe is preparing to roll out retail crypto trading to tens of millions of customers via its app.

For Santander, this is hardly a first encounter with blockchain. Back in 2018, it rolled out One Pay FX, a Ripple-based payments service that gave retail customers faster cross-border transfers. Since then, the bank has weighed the idea of launching its own stablecoins and retail-facing crypto products, signaling that today’s launch is part of a long-term strategy.

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Globally, banks are moving in the same direction. In the U.S., passage of the GENIUS Act earlier this year has opened the door for institutions like JPMorgan, Citigroup and Bank of America to consider launching dollar-pegged tokens and crypto services of their own.

By using Germany as the entry point, Santander places Openbank at the front of Europe’s rapidly intensifying competition. The question now is how quickly traditional banks can turn crypto services from an experiment into a mainstream offering.

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