Bank Leumi's Crypto Plan With Galaxy Is Its Second Try — Regulator Still Has to Sign Off

4 min readPublished 15 Aug 2026

Bank Leumi, Israel’s largest bank, said Friday it will let customers trade bitcoin, ether and solana directly inside its Leumi Trade app, using Galaxy Digital for trading and custody infrastructure. CoinDesk, Cointelegraph, Decrypt and Crypto Briefing all reported the launch is targeted for early 2027 and would make Leumi the first Israeli bank to offer digital-asset trading directly to retail customers.

What most of that coverage leaves out is that Leumi has been here before. Decrypt alone reports that the bank tried something almost identical in March 2022, when its Pepper Invest unit said it would enable bitcoin and ether trading through crypto infrastructure firm Paxos — and also billed itself as Israel’s first bank to do so. That service never launched. Decrypt reports the deal stalled at the Bank of Israel, which withheld the regulatory sign-off the plan needed. The new Leumi-Galaxy plan faces the same gate: Decrypt reports the early 2027 target remains subject to Bank of Israel approval.

What the companies announced

According to CoinDesk, Cointelegraph, Decrypt and Crypto Briefing, Leumi customers and users of its mobile banking arm, Pepper, will gain the ability to buy, hold and sell bitcoin, ether and solana in a dedicated section of the Leumi Trade capital-markets app. Galaxy will handle execution through GalaxyOne Institutional, its platform built for banks and asset managers, while custody will run on the platform formerly known as GK8, all four outlets reported. Crypto Briefing reported that Bank Leumi signed a separate agreement to use that custody infrastructure to support the offering.

Bank Leumi’s head of strategy, Maya Ravia, commented on the initiative, according to CoinDesk and Crypto Briefing. CoinDesk reported she described digital assets as an increasingly integral part of the global financial system; Crypto Briefing reported she framed the move as part of the bank’s broader innovation strategy. Galaxy Israel CEO Lior Lamesh also commented. Decrypt quoted Lamesh directly saying the future of finance will run on open, programmable rails, and that he believes early-moving banks will define the era that follows. Decrypt also quoted him saying Leumi is the first bank in Israel to bring digital assets to its customers, and that it “chose Galaxy, to make it possible.”

Where the coverage agrees — and where it diverges

On the core mechanics, CoinDesk, Cointelegraph, Decrypt and Crypto Briefing are aligned: three assets (bitcoin, ether, solana), one app (Leumi Trade), one infrastructure partner (Galaxy, via GalaxyOne Institutional and its former GK8 custody unit), and one target window (early 2027). The Block‘s headline, the only piece of that outlet’s coverage available here, matches that framing.

The divergence is about context, not numbers. Decrypt is alone in reporting the 2022 Paxos precedent and the Bank of Israel’s role in killing it. Decrypt is also alone in laying out the specific 2026 regulatory changes it says make a second attempt more plausible: the Bank of Israel removing automatic delays on crypto-linked deposits and barring blanket refusals of funds from licensed providers, the Capital Market Authority setting wallet-security and capital standards of 2 million New Israeli Shekels for non-custody firms and 2.5 million New Israeli Shekels for firms holding custody, and an August 1 circular opening trading to the top 50 coins by market cap above a $500 million threshold. Decrypt also reports that Galaxy holds a New York DFS BitLicense and a money-transmission license dated May 2026, and that Leumi serves roughly 2.5 million retail customers.

None of that appears in CoinDesk’s, Cointelegraph’s or Crypto Briefing’s coverage, which treat Friday’s announcement largely as a standalone launch story rather than a second act. Cointelegraph, meanwhile, is the only outlet to place the deal against Galaxy’s own financial backdrop: it reported Galaxy posted an $85 million net loss in the second quarter, attributed largely to declining digital-asset prices, even as Cointelegraph reported the company’s digital-assets unit posted $66 million in adjusted gross profit, a 34% increase versus the prior quarter. Cointelegraph also reported, citing Yahoo Finance data, that Galaxy shares changed hands near $21.38 that Friday morning — a roughly 2% daily gain but a decline of about 25% versus a year earlier. None of the other outlets in this evidence set carried those figures.

Why the regulatory gate matters

The 2022 attempt and the 2027 target share more than a name. Both route through Leumi’s Pepper-branded digital arm, both were billed by the bank as an Israeli-banking first, and both depend on the same regulator’s approval to actually go live. Decrypt’s reporting suggests the difference this time is that the rules underneath the plan have shifted: looser deposit handling, defined capital thresholds for custody and non-custody firms, and a circular that widens the list of coins banks can offer beyond the short list that constrained licensed firms previously. Whether that shift is enough to get Bank of Israel sign-off where the 2022 plan failed is not something any of the reporting in this evidence set resolves.

What remains unresolved

CoinDesk reported the companies did not disclose commercial terms, fees or customer eligibility requirements for the new service, and that CoinDesk had reached out to Bank Leumi for further comment. No outlet in this evidence set reports that Bank of Israel approval has been granted for the 2027 plan; Decrypt describes it as still pending. No outlet reports whether other Israeli banks are preparing comparable offerings in response to Leumi’s announcement.

What to watch

The near-term marker is the Bank of Israel’s decision on the new plan — the same regulatory step that stopped Leumi’s 2022 effort. Beyond that, confirmation of pricing and eligibility terms ahead of the early-2027 target, any competitive response from other Israeli banks, and Galaxy’s subsequent quarterly disclosures on its digital-assets business, given the second-quarter net loss Cointelegraph reported, are the threads left open by this week’s coverage.