Gemini’s Shift to Multi-Party Computation Marks a New Era in Crypto Custody

In today’s rapidly evolving crypto landscape, security, speed, and scalability are a top priority for exchanges and their users. Recognizing this need, Gemini has transitioned to a multi-party computation (MPC) cryptographic protocol for institutional grade custody. This upgrade creates a custody ecosystem built for the future of crypto.

For the first time, every net-new Gemini Custody account now opens with MPC infrastructure. And existing Gemini Custody customers will be transitioned to MPC under a coordinated migration that will be communicated separately.

MPC is A Major Step Forward for Scalability and Speed

With MPC, crypto withdrawals now typically complete in minutes. Gemini Custody customers no longer need to wait for legacy daily runs to receive their digital assets.

Customers can now transact on a variety of new blockchains including Tron, SUI, MON, Hype, Arbitrum, XRPL and others. Gemini Custody now supports newer signature schemes to keep pace with the innovating landscape of crypto.

As crypto adoption grows and transaction volumes increase, Gemini's MPC system can handle near instantaneous withdrawals, while maintaining custom policy approval logic that is right for your team.

Gemini’s move to MPC modernizes the technology behind Custody while preserving the custodial relationship customers rely on. The updated infrastructure supports faster, more responsive transactions and reflects the high security standards we set for the product.

How Gemini’s Upgraded Custody Improves Security

Customers authorize transfers with designated passkeys—for example, a customer may sign into the platform with a digital passkey, but authorize transfers with a separate hardware key. Your policy. Your terms. Separately, with MPC, key shares are distributed and never combined to reconstruct the complete private key—not in storage or during signing.

Our current multi-signature setup already protects against any single point of failure, and MPC takes that a step further. Because each transaction is signed without the full key ever coming together, customers get the same strong protection against cyberattacks with real practical gains: faster, lower-cost transactions, custody addresses that look like any other, and the flexibility to support a far wider range of assets over time.

Gemini's MPC offering ensures that each MPC signer undergoes separate upgrades and operates with independent governance, which involves cryptographic attestations to software that runs in the environment. This allows customers to receive the most secure experience possible.

Implementing Updated Protocols for Moving Digital Assets

We're upgrading how transactions are secured and signed, making moving your crypto simple and seamless. Here's what's new:

• How you authorize: You authorize address-book changes and withdrawals with your own passkey, which is phishing-resistant because it's bound to the genuine Gemini site.

• How transactions are signed: The complete private key is never assembled — not in storage, not during signing. Each share alone reveals nothing, and every transfer is verified end to end at the signer level.

• Your custody accounts: Existing customers move to new custody accounts, with new deposit addresses on each network.

What Stays the Same

• Regulated, qualified custody: Your assets stay with Gemini Trust Company, LLC, a New York State-chartered trust company and qualified custodian under New York Banking Law.

• Segregated client assets: Your assets remain segregated on-chain in unique, independently verifiable addresses with the same custodian.

• Your account-level controls: Account policies like Multi-User Approval that require more than one user to approve remain available and as configurable as today.

A New Era

As the crypto market evolves, custody infrastructure must keep up. That’s why we’ve migrated to a new system that offers better security, faster transactions, and a wider selection of available blockchains. This is just the beginning for Gemini 2.0.

Onward and Upward,
Team Gemini