Comptroller Jonathan Gould said firms engaged in legally permissible activities, including “digital assets and other novel technologies,” should have a path to becoming a national bank, adding: “America and the OCC are once again open for business.”
The statement does not automatically approve crypto companies as banks. Applicants still have to pass the OCC’s normal chartering review, including scrutiny of management, capital, business plans, compliance and financial risk.
Gould’s comments arrive with a growing digital-asset licensing queue already visible at the OCC.
The regulator’s digital-assets licensing database tracks applicants planning to offer digital-asset products or services, including crypto-assets.
Regulatory Tracker
Zero Hash provides another example of the demand for federal status. As Coindoo reported in March, the company applied for a national trust bank charter covering services including digital-asset custody, staking, transfers and stablecoin-related activity.
Crypto is only one part of the broader charter revival. The OCC says it has received 40 de novo applications over the past 18 months and, in many cases, reached decisions within 120 days after receiving a complete application.
Many crypto firms seeking federal banking status are not trying to become conventional banks that take retail deposits and make ordinary loans.
National trust banks offer a narrower route centered on permitted trust-company activities such as custody and related financial services. The OCC’s 2026 final trust-bank rule confirmed that national banks limited to trust-company operations may also conduct qualifying non-fiduciary activities without expanding the OCC’s underlying chartering authority.
Coinbase shows what that looks like in practice. As Coindoo explained following its conditional approval, a national trust charter can bring custody and related activities under an OCC federal charter without turning the company into a conventional deposit-taking bank.
The regulatory path changes when insured deposits enter the picture.
The OCC grants national bank charters, while the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation separately decides whether an institution qualifies for federal deposit insurance. The FDIC reviews applications based on factors including capital, management, the business plan and potential risk to the Deposit Insurance Fund.
The new OCC announcement specifically praises the FDIC’s effort to make that process clearer for new banks. Chairman Travis Hill has also said the agency wants to encourage de novo formation and approach innovative business models with an open mind while keeping the statutory standards for insured institutions intact.
The FDIC changes are therefore most directly relevant to digital-asset applicants that plan to take federally insured deposits.
Federal supervisors are also moving away from using reputation risk to restrict relationships with lawful businesses.
The OCC and FDIC have removed reputation risk as a basis for adverse supervisory action, shifting the focus toward identifiable financial, operational and compliance risks instead of whether a business is politically controversial.
Digital-asset applicants still have to demonstrate competent management, adequate financial resources and controls capable of handling sanctions, money laundering, cybersecurity and operational risks.
For crypto, the practical change is straightforward: exposure to digital assets should trigger a risk assessment, not an automatic stop sign.
Many U.S. crypto businesses have historically operated through combinations of state money-transmission licences, state trust charters and specialist regulatory regimes.
A national charter offers a different route: an OCC federal charter and a framework for bringing permitted activities such as custody, settlement and related financial services into the national banking system.
The trade-off is heavier supervision. Firms choosing that path accept bank-level regulatory scrutiny in exchange for operating within an established federal structure.
The growing application queue shows that some of the industry’s largest infrastructure providers consider that worthwhile. Gould’s “open for business” message now has a measurable test: which of those applicants can satisfy the OCC’s standards and make it through the charter process.
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