Austrian banking group Raiffeisen Bank International and crypto platform Bitpanda signed a framework agreement on 23 September 2026 to give roughly 18 million customers across Central and Eastern Europe direct access to crypto-assets through their existing banking apps — one of the largest such deployments by a traditional European banking group.
🔑 Key takeaways
- Framework agreement signed 23 September 2026 between RBI and Bitpanda
- Potential reach: 18 million customers across 11 CEE markets
- Bitpanda Enterprise provides the crypto stack; local banks keep the client relationship
- Builds on the Austrian Mein ELBA pilot launched in 2024
- Bitpanda holds a MiCA licence in Austria since April 2025
An Austrian precedent turned reference case
In 2024, Raiffeisenlandesbank Niederösterreich-Wien became the first traditional bank in the European Union to let retail clients buy and sell crypto-assets directly from its Mein ELBA mobile banking app. Bitpanda provided the back-end infrastructure — order matching, custody, compliance — while the bank retained the full client relationship and front-end experience. No separate Bitpanda account was required.
Months later, Raiffeisen-Landesbank Tirol adopted the same architecture, confirming that the model could be replicated across the Austrian Raiffeisen cooperative network. The two deployments acted as a proving ground, measuring real client appetite, operational load and integration costs before the pan-European agreement.
A unified framework for 11 markets
Until this agreement, RBI–Bitpanda collaborations were negotiated on a bank-by-bank basis. The new framework introduces a shared architecture that the group’s 11 subsidiary banks can activate to offer crypto services under their own brand.
Raiffeisen Bank International serves approximately 18 million clients across its subsidiaries in Central and Eastern Europe — Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Albania depending on network composition. One source puts the figure at 18.8 million as of end-June 2026, representing potential reach rather than immediate active users.
From pilots to a group-wide framework
| Initiative | Scope | Customers concerned | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| RLB Niederösterreich-Wien (Mein ELBA) | Austria | Several hundred thousand | Early 2024 |
| RLB Tirol | Austria (Tyrol) | Several hundred thousand | 2025 |
| RBI / Bitpanda framework agreement | 11 CEE countries | ~18 million (potential) | 23 Sep 2026 |
Under the deal, Bitpanda Enterprise provides the crypto stack while participating banks keep their own applications and client relationship. Customers will therefore access digital assets through their existing banking platform, with no extra app or separate Bitpanda account.
Bitpanda Enterprise, the B2B arm
Bitpanda Enterprise is the group’s B2B division serving banks, fintechs, brokers, prop trading firms and family offices. Its offering spans investment infrastructure, liquidity, custody, payments, stablecoins and tokenisation, with compliance and scalability built in as design priorities.
On the regulatory side, Bitpanda GmbH obtained a Crypto-Asset Service Provider (CASP) authorisation from Austria’s Financial Market Authority (FMA) in April 2025 under the European MiCA framework. The licence covers custody, exchange of funds for crypto, order execution and transmission, placement and transfer of digital assets — enough to operate across the EU.
Beyond Raiffeisen, Bitpanda already serves several European banking partners, including German neobank N26 and Austrian provincial banks that are shareholders of Raiffeisen. The company has signed additional partnerships in Germany and is preparing a potential IPO.
Sector context: the bank rush into crypto
The deal is part of a broader global adoption wave. Over the past 18 months, BBVA (Spain), Openbank (Santander), several German cooperative and savings banks, SoFi, PNC, Charles Schwab and Morgan Stanley have all launched or announced retail crypto trading and custody services.
Three drivers converge: measurable customer demand, the regulatory clarity brought by Europe’s MiCA framework, the surge in stablecoin volumes, and the need for banks to monetise existing client bases without ceding the entire flow to specialised venues.
« We are seeing growing demand for crypto-assets across our markets, and we are responding with a strong and proven partner. As a client-centric bank, their needs are at the heart of what we do. »
Michael Höllerer, CEO of Raiffeisen Bank International
Bitpanda co-CEO Christian Trummer described the partnership to Bloomberg as a « gateway between today’s structures and tomorrow’s possibilities », built on « infrastructure capable of operating across institutions, markets and national borders ».
Open questions and blind spots
Several operational parameters remain undisclosed: fee schedule for end clients, custody model (bank-side custody, segregated accounts, Bitpanda sub-custody), and the exact split of operational responsibilities between Bitpanda Enterprise and each local bank.
The announcement also does not detail the feature set: spot trading only, transfers to self-custody wallets, staking, crypto ETPs or stablecoins. Each subsidiary bank will retain discretion over its product range and launch schedule, depending on local regulatory constraints — a critical point for RBI’s non-EU markets where the MiCA licence alone is insufficient.
Conclusion
With 18 million customers potentially exposed to an in-app crypto service, Raiffeisen Bank International could orchestrate one of the largest banking-led crypto rollouts in Europe. If the promise holds, it will serve as a template for other European banking groups and a strong signal of normalisation for digital assets in retail banking.
The next quarters will show whether client appetite matches the headline numbers and whether Bitpanda Enterprise’s white-label model holds up at scale across 11 heterogeneous jurisdictions.
Sources
This article is published for informational and educational purposes only. It does not constitute investment advice. Do your own research (DYOR) before making any decision.
