What is self-custody?

Coins on an exchange are an entry in the exchange's database. The exchange holds the keys and you hold a claim. With self-custody the keys sit in your own software or hardware wallet, and no exchange can freeze the funds or lend them out. Issuer tokens are the exception: Circle can freeze USDC and Tether can freeze USDT at any address, yours included. Not your keys, not your coins.

FTX made the argument for everyone in November 2022. Withdrawals stopped, and customers learned their deposits had been used elsewhere. People holding their own keys that week had nothing to wait for.

The trade is counterparty risk for personal risk. A lost phrase, a phishing site, an unlimited token approval, a transfer on the wrong network: all of it is on you now, with no one to call. A common split is savings on a hardware wallet, and only what you are actively trading in a hot wallet or on an exchange.

Self-custody also scatters your holdings. You might keep ETH on a hardware wallet, SOL in a phone wallet and USDC on Base in a browser extension. No login shows the total, so you watch the three public addresses together instead.

Also called: non-custodial, not your keys, not your coins.

Cashboard is not a wallet and never holds keys. It reads self-custodied holdings from public EVM, Solana and Hyperliquid addresses, so the hardware wallet, the phone wallet and the browser extension from the example above can sit on one board, each in its own Portfolio widget.

• Portfolio
• Net worth

• Seed phrase
• Watch-only wallet
• Public address
• Net worth