Most Batswana know their bank as the place that takes deposits, pays interest, and offers loans. Few think about the machinery that keeps track of shares, bonds, or funds, because only a small slice of the population owns them. Yet in the background sits a service that every institutional investor relies on, and that may soon matter to households and companies as well: custody.
When Standard Chartered Bank Botswana announced in 2024 that it would sell its retail and wealth businesses, many wondered if the country’s oldest commercial bank was pulling back. It first opened its doors in Francistown in 1897 and has seen every economic cycle since. The decision was not a retreat. It was a recalibration. The Bank is reshaping itself around corporate and investment banking, and custody is one of the key pillars of that strategy.
Custodial services involve safekeeping assets, settling trades, crediting coupons, recording ownership, and ensuring that investors receive their entitlements. To institutions, it is indispensable. To foreign investors, it is often the only bridge into a local market. “We provide asset safety, market access and risk mitigation,” said Pearl Matong, Client Solutions Manager and Head, Financing and Securities Services at Standard Chartered. “That is what builds investor confidence.”
The mechanics are simple but vital as custodians safeguard assets on behalf of clients, reconcile holdings daily, and deliver the reporting that auditors and regulators require. They collect dividends, process rights issues and votes, lead market advocacy, share market insights with investors and act as the local contact for foreign money. In the past, investors clutched paper certificates. Today the assets are digital, but the need for security and transparency has increased in importance.
Botswana’s market has grown steadily over the years, evidenced by Botswana Stock Exchange (BSE) growing market capitalisation, but trading remains thin and concentrated. Institutional investors dominate. Pension funds are the main actors, followed by insurers and banks. Unit trusts add to the pool. Retail participation is limited. Foreign activity, once steady, has dwindled. In 2023, foreign companies accounted for more than half of all equity turnover. In 2024 their share fell below ten percent, leaving local institutions to drive more than three quarters of trading. Individual Batswana, though slowly growing as investors, only just crossed into double digits.
The bond market is deeper but also narrow. The Ministry of Finance auctions Treasury bonds. The Bank of Botswana issues Treasury bills and its own certificates (BoBCs). Outstanding government securities have risen, but the investor base is clustered. By 2025, commercial banks held over P21 billion of bills and bonds, about sixty percent of all outstanding government paper. Pension funds and insurers held most of the rest. Smaller savers and foreign funds were largely absent.
“In order to open a settlement account or buy government bonds, clients need a custodian,” Ms. Matong explained. “They also need a safe place to hold assets locally.”
Client assets are segregated, entitlements handled on time, and records kept with precision. If a foreign investor wires funds into Gaborone to settle a purchase of securities, the custodian is the assurance that exchange of funds for assets happens, and assets remain safe and accessible. In frontier markets, where information gaps are common and liquidity is limited, that assurance matters as much as yield.
This is where Standard Chartered has staked its advantage. It is the only international bank in Botswana and the only one offering custody. It runs a single global platform across markets such as—London, Singapore, Dubai, and Gaborone—so clients see their holdings in real time wherever they trade. “We can cut down turnaround times and eliminate multiple intermediaries,” Ms. Matong said. “It is a “single stance” platform, real time.”
The Bank’s regional strength has not gone unnoticed. In 2025, Global Finance named Standard Chartered Bank Botswana as the Best Sub-Custodian Bank in the country, citing its deep market knowledge, service efficiency, and international reach. For a market eager to reassure investors, such recognition matters. It signals that Botswana’s custodial infrastructure is not a weak link.
The problem, as Matong pointed out, is that the market is still too concentrated. “We are predominantly a buy-and-hold market,” she said. Large investors enter and hold positions for long periods. Liquidity suffers. Spreads remain wide. Prices can move on little volume.
Retail savers and local companies currently keep cash in deposits, mobile wallets, and insurance products. Few own listed equities or government bonds. Treasury bills and shorter-dated bonds could be a natural starting point. They are simple, predictable, and safe. Yet access remains cumbersome. Some instruments settle at the stock exchange, others at the central bank. Procedures differ. Paperwork is slow.
Custodians have a crucial role to play. With mobile-based settlement accounts, automated coupon payments, and consolidated dashboards, custody could make government securities a mainstream savings product. For companies with excess cash, custody offers a similar path. A local business could diversify out of deposits by buying bills or corporate paper, secure in the knowledge that the custodian manages entitlements and record-keeping. That is how a banking service once confined to global funds becomes part of financial inclusion.
Liquidity is not only about who participates. It is also about what is available to trade. At present, equities and conventional bonds dominate. For pension funds that must now hold half their assets onshore, this concentration is a problem. They need more instruments: infrastructure bonds tied to revenue projects, municipal papers, sustainability-linked instruments, and structured notes.
“There is a lot of opportunity for the local market to receive funds,” Ms. Matong said. “What we need to do is make sure there are more investable assets so pension funds can diversify.”
To get there, the market’s plumbing must improve. Botswana’s insolvency regime should make explicit that client assets are segregated and portable. Account structures must be harmonized across institutions, so ownership is clear. Settlement processes at the BSE and the central bank should be aligned to avoid confusion. Market data, issuance calendars, turnover, and yields should be available on public platforms without delay.
“Countries that make information easy to access tend to attract more investors,” Ms. Matong observed. Transparency, she argued, is not cosmetic. It is what makes a market investable.
Standard Chartered’s custodial pitch leans on global consistency. The Bank stresses that clients in Botswana receive the same service as those in Europe or Asia. Its “single stance” custody model means one platform can give investors access to multiple markets. In practice, that reduces costs, shortens settlement times, and eliminates chains of intermediaries.
This reputation is part of why international recognition, such as the Global Finance award, resonates. Custody is about keeping promises investors rarely see until something goes wrong. A global name at the centre of that promise matters. “Investors want to know their assets are safe,” Ms. Matong said. “That’s where we come in.”
Botswana faces clear challenges. Diamond revenues are lower. Fiscal pressures are real. Liquidity strains have appeared. Yet the fundamentals remain strong: a stable currency, low inflation by regional standards, well-capitalised banks, and regulators who are receptive to change.
For Standard Chartered, the choice to exit retail banking and lean into corporate and investment services is a bet that the next wave of growth will come not from deposits and loans, but from capital markets. Custody is central to that bet.
If the infrastructure can reassure investors, if the investor base can diversify, and if more instruments are developed, then capital will come. It may not make headlines, but it will fund the projects that shape the economy. And in the quiet machinery behind it all, the custodian will be holding the keys.
