Coinbase (COIN) said Thursday it received initial approval for a national trust company charter from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Bloomberg reported, marking a step toward operating as a federally regulated crypto custodian.
Approval is not final. This is a conditional green light that sets out the requirements that Coinbase must meet before it can receive a full charter. These typically include setting up compliance systems, hiring key personnel and conducting regulatory reviews. The OCC also expects companies to demonstrate that they can manage risks, protect customer assets and comply with anti-money laundering rules. Only once these steps are completed can the agency grant full approval.
“We still need final approval… our business will not operate under an OCC charter until we have that final approval,” Coinbase General Counsel Paul Grewal told CoinDesk. “This next phase allows us to go into more detail about how we can expand our activities in ways that are exciting and important to the development of crypto.”
If finalized, the charter would allow Coinbase to operate an uninsured domestic trust company. This structure allows the company to hold digital assets on behalf of its clients, but prohibits it from accepting deposits or making loans.
Coinbase first applied for the charter in October, alongside companies such as Ripple. More recently, Citadel-backed exchange EDX Markets said it had filed an application for a similar structure. The app group indicates growing demand for regulated custody as large investors enter crypto markets.
For institutions, custody is less about trading and more about trust. A pension fund, for example, may want exposure to Bitcoin but needs a regulated entity to hold the asset securely. A federal charter can provide this assurance, while state licenses cannot.
The move is part of Coinbase’s efforts to rely less on trading fees, which can vary with market cycles. Childcare offers more stable income. The company already acts as a custodian for several U.S. spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds, holding the underlying assets on behalf of the fund managers.
“The big opportunity going forward would be payments…custody-adjacent but separate,” Grewal said. “We believe we will be able to offer our customers a much broader range of products and services than ever before.”
UPDATE (April 2, 4:57 p.m. UTC): Adds comments from Coinbase General Counsel Paul Grewal.
