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A token is not the same thing as the asset or legal claim it represents. Its existence on a blockchain does not, by itself, establish who owns the underlying asset, what rights a holder can enforce, how those rights fare if a provider fails, or who can restore access after a disruption. Those answers depend on the token’s legal structure, contracts, the parties’ roles, governing law, and technical design.
Before buying or holding a tokenized asset, identify who owes you what, who controls the token and any underlying assets, and what the documented recovery process can actually do. Custody, compliance, operational resilience, and recovery are related—but they are not interchangeable protections.
What does a token give you a right to?
Start with the legal arrangement, not the token’s name or the fact that it appears on a ledger. A token might represent a claim against an issuer, an interest in an arrangement holding an asset, or some other right set out in its governing documents. The blockchain record alone does not tell you which one applies.
Find the documents that define the holder’s rights and answer these questions:
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- What does the token legally represent, and which entity is responsible for the related obligation?
- Who holds title to any underlying asset, and where is it held?
- What contractual right can a holder enforce, including any redemption right and its conditions?
- Which law and jurisdiction govern the token, the underlying asset, and the service providers?
- What happens to the holder’s rights if the issuer or custodian becomes insolvent, the ledger is migrated or forked, or the blockchain is unavailable?
Do not assume that owning a token means owning the underlying asset directly, or that a technical ability to transfer it guarantees a legal right to redeem it. Those conclusions require the relevant legal and contractual terms.
Who is responsible for custody and compliance?
“Custody” can refer to different parts of the arrangement. A service provider may safeguard tokens or the credentials that allow access to them; an issuer may separately arrange custody of assets backing a token. A bank, issuer, crypto-asset service provider (CASP), reserve custodian, and technology vendor may each have a different role. Determine which entity performs each function and which rules apply to that activity, token, customer, and jurisdiction.
| Party or function | What to establish |
|---|---|
| Token issuer | What rights the token represents, who is responsible for those rights, and what issuance, redemption, and recovery terms apply. |
| CASP custodian | Who controls the tokens or access credentials, how client positions are recorded, and what the custody agreement says about segregation, liability, subcontracting, and changes to the ledger. |
| Reserve custodian | For a reserve-backed arrangement, what assets are held, who holds them, whether they are encumbered, and how quickly they can be accessed for redemptions. |
| Bank or technology provider | What activity the party actually performs, what legal and regulatory scope applies, and how outsourcing or other third-party dependencies are managed. |
European Union: distinguish CASP custody from reserve custody
MiCA sets out custody and administration duties for CASPs in Article 75. Among other things, a CASP must maintain a custody policy that safeguards or controls clients’ crypto-assets or the means of access and minimizes loss risks from fraud, cyber threats, or negligence. Article 75 also addresses client agreements, records of client positions, and rights where changes to the underlying distributed ledger technology (DLT) may create or modify client rights. The rules provide for legal segregation of clients’ crypto-assets from the CASP’s estate under applicable law; that qualification matters and is not a blanket promise of a particular insolvency outcome. See ESMA’s MiCA Article 75 entry and the official text of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114.
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MiCA Article 75(3) states: “The custody policy referred to in the first subparagraph shall minimise the risk of a loss of clients’ crypto-assets or the rights related to those crypto-assets or the means of access to the crypto-assets due to fraud, cyber threats or negligence.”
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Reserve custody is a separate issue. Under MiCA Article 37, issuers of asset-referenced tokens must arrange custody of reserve assets, avoid encumbering them, preserve prompt access for redemptions, and avoid concentration of custodians and reserve assets. Which custodians are eligible depends on the nature of the reserve assets. These issuer duties do not replace questions about the custody of a customer’s token. Consult MiCA’s official legal text.
United States: bank guidance has a defined scope
In a 7 May 2025 release, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) clarified that national banks and federal savings associations may conduct specified crypto-asset custody and execution activities and outsource bank-permissible crypto activities, subject to appropriate third-party risk management. A 14 July 2025 interagency statement reminded banks that crypto-asset safekeeping must be conducted safely and soundly and in compliance with applicable law. These statements address banks within their regulatory scope; they are not a comprehensive rule for every token issuer or service provider. See the OCC release and the Federal Reserve release.
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Do not treat a regulatory label, licence, or bank relationship as a substitute for reading the agreement that governs your own account and token. The provider’s role and the law applicable to each part of the arrangement still matter.
What should you check about custody, keys, and transaction controls?
Custody risk includes both control of the asset and control of access to it. A provider may hold private keys itself, use a shared or delegated arrangement, or rely on another company for key infrastructure. The important questions are who can act, how actions are approved, and what happens if a key is lost, compromised, or unavailable.
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- Control: Who can initiate, approve, pause, or execute a transaction? Are duties divided so that one compromised person or credential cannot make an unchecked transfer?
- Records: How does the provider reconcile its records with on-chain balances and document each client’s position?
- Key lifecycle: How are keys created, stored, backed up, synchronized, rotated, revoked, and restored? Who is authorized to perform each action?
- Incidents: Who can freeze or pause transactions, under what threshold, and how are customers notified?
- Contract and subcontracting: Does the agreement explain liability, reporting, service interruptions, and the use of sub-custodians or other vendors?
Hardware security modules (HSMs) can protect cryptographic key operations, but the device or service does not answer who has legal control, who can authorize a transaction, or how customers regain access. AWS documents that, in its CloudHSM cluster setting, a key may be lost if an HSM fails before synchronization; its guidance discusses client-side synchronization and using at least two HSMs to improve durability. That is a vendor-specific implementation example, not a universal prescription or proof that an HSM alone solves custody and recovery. See AWS CloudHSM documentation and its guidance on key synchronization.
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What does “recovery” mean in a token arrangement?
Recovery is not one process. Restoring key access, stopping transfers, migrating or reissuing tokens, redeeming an underlying value, and restoring an issuer’s operations require different authorities and dependencies. A plan that covers one of these does not establish that the others will work.
| Recovery action | What it can address | What to verify |
|---|---|---|
| Restore key access | A lost, unavailable, or disrupted credential or key-management service. | Who can authorize restoration, what backups or recovery factors exist, and whether recovery depends on the same provider or infrastructure that failed. |
| Pause or restrict transfers | Some incidents involving a compromised credential, smart contract, or service. | Who has pause authority, the trigger and approval process, what transfers are affected, and how users are informed. |
| Migrate or reissue tokens | A change to the token or ledger implementation. | Who can authorize the change, how holder positions and rights are verified, and what happens to the old tokens and disputed or inaccessible balances. |
| Redeem underlying value | A holder’s contractual route to exchange a token for money or an underlying asset, if one exists. | Eligibility, timing, fees, limits, suspension powers, and the assets or resources available to meet redemptions. |
| Restore issuer operations | Disruption to the issuer’s services or ability to meet applicable requirements. | Which services the plan covers, what measures may be used, and whether recovery of operations also preserves the holder’s ability to redeem. |
Recovery plans can include limits on redemption
For issuers of asset-referenced tokens, MiCA Article 46 addresses recovery planning, including restoring compliance with reserve requirements and preserving or recovering services. Options listed in the regulation include redemption fees, limits, or suspension. These are possible recovery measures—not a guarantee of immediate redemption in every circumstance. The European Banking Authority’s recovery-plan guidelines under MiCAR are marked final and applicable, with an application/compliance date of 13 November 2024. See MiCA Articles 37 and 46 and the EBA guidelines.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How should you assess operational resilience?
Resilience means more than storing keys securely. It also depends on governance, transaction controls, incident detection and response, smart-contract risks, and the third parties needed to keep the service working. Ask what happens if a blockchain, custody provider, key-management system, cloud service, or subcontractor becomes unavailable or compromised.
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On 8 July 2026, ESMA announced a common supervisory action examining CASPs’ digital operational resilience, including governance, key and storage management, transaction controls, incident detection and response, smart-contract risks, and third-party dependencies. National authorities were scheduled to conduct the exercise from the second half of 2026 through the first half of 2027. The announcement describes the exercise’s scope and timetable, not final findings. See ESMA’s announcement.
For your own due diligence, look for documented decision-makers and thresholds: who can declare an incident, activate continuity measures, pause transactions, or initiate recovery? Also ask how the provider will communicate and maintain records during an outage, and whether its plan depends on the same systems or companies affected by the incident.
How can you compare custody or token arrangements?
Compare arrangements using the same questions and for the same type of token and jurisdiction. A provider’s technical controls cannot, by themselves, establish superior legal protection, and regulatory or vendor documentation is not a comparative product test.
- Legal structure: Identify the right represented by the token, the owner of any underlying asset, and the entity that owes the holder a duty or redemption obligation.
- Custody and insolvency: Identify who controls the assets and credentials, whether legal segregation applies, which law governs it, and how insolvency treatment is addressed.
- Key and transaction governance: Establish who can create, approve, pause, and execute transactions, and how key loss, compromise, rotation, and recovery are handled.
- Operational resilience: Review the response to chain outages, smart-contract problems, compromised credentials, provider failures, and third-party outages.
- Reserve and redemption: For reserve-backed tokens, identify reserve custodians and assets, concentration risks, and the terms that govern redemption during stress.
- Third parties and jurisdiction: Identify subcontractors and sub-custodians, where assets and records are located, and which regulator and law govern each activity.
If the provider cannot explain who has authority to act in a failure, what rights you retain, and which recovery steps are actually available under the contract, treat that as an unresolved risk rather than assuming the token’s technical design fills the gap.
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