KEY POINTS
- A spokesperson said the company was thankful of ex-CEO Treccani's contributions
- Ripple acquired Metaco in 2023 for $250 amid reported concerns among Metaco's bank partners
- The leadership losses come just months after HSBC partnered with Metaco for the former's digital custody service
Two leaders of Metaco, the cryptocurrency custody firm that payment protocol and exchange network Ripple acquired earlier last year, have left the company, a spokesperson confirmed Monday.
Metaco CEO Adrien Treccani and chief of Metaco's product department, Peter DeMeo, have left the company, a Ripple spokesperson confirmed Monday, as per CoinDesk. "We appreciate the strong and industry-leading custody business that Adrien and his team built, as well as his leadership in integrating the custody team and solution with Ripple following the acquisition last year," the spokesperson said.
Lausanne-based Metaco, which was acquired for $250 million in May 2023 by Ripple, was subject to speculation just weeks after its acquisition over the alleged concern among some banks Metaco had partnerships with.
At the time, Bloomberg reported that banking giant Citigroup was reviewing its partnership with Metaco after it was acquired by Ripple, which has been under tight scrutiny by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) since December 2020 over its alleged violations of securities laws. Metaco was chosen as Citigroup's custody partner in June 2022 as part of the investment banking company's tokenized securities expansion.
News of Treccani and DeMeo's departure come at a time when Ripple is grappling with the SEC in courtroom battles in a lawsuit wherein the regulator accused Ripple of illegally selling its blockchain's native XRP token.
The organizational shakeup also comes around three months after Metaco and HSBC announced a partnership for the financial services company's new digital assets custody service.
Under the partnership, HSBC said it will use Metaco's institutional platform, Harmonize, as part of the London-headquartered bank's digital assets custody service. "Metaco's Harmonize solution helps unify security and management of digital asset operations," HSBC said in a press release.
HSBC's Chief Digital, Data and Innovation Officer of Securities Services, Zhu Kuang Lee, was optimistic of the partnership, saying the bank has seen an increasing demand for custody of digital assets as the finance market evolves, and key partnerships should help HSBC deliver "the next-generation custody infrastructure that will be scalable and secure."
Meanwhile, Ripple's legal woes continue as a U.S. judge recently ordered the crypto company to produce its 2022-2023 financial statements, as requested by the SEC.
Ripple opposed the regulator's motion to compel it to produce post-complaint statements, saying the SEC's request was unjustified and irrelevant. However, U.S. Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn said the SEC "credibly" justified its argument that the documents can help determine Ripple's penalties.
