Bastion receives preliminary OCC approval for a national trust bank charter to offer stablecoin custody, payments, and issuance services to institutions.
DeFi & Yields ·
Bastion has received preliminary approval from the OCC to operate as a national trust bank, clearing a major regulatory hurdle for its planned stablecoin infrastructure serving institutional clients. The charter will permit the company to offer custody, payments, and issuance services to hedge funds, registered investment advisers, and other institutional actors that typically require their custodians to hold a recognized federal banking license.
The OCC, an independent Treasury Department bureau established in 1863, grants federal trust charters that operate nationwide and supersede state-by-state licensing regimes. A national trust charter authorizes fiduciary activities and asset custody but does not include deposit-taking powers; holders remain subject to continuous OCC examination and capital rules. For crypto firms, the federal designation signals operational legitimacy to institutional counterparties in ways that state trust licenses alone typically cannot.
Preliminary approval is not final authorization, and the extent of conditions attached to Bastion's charter—or the timeline to full approval—has not been disclosed. The company joins a small cohort of digital asset firms that have pursued OCC trust charters to establish federally supervised custody and stablecoin operations.