The licence, approved last week by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), will help Coinbase grow its custody business and move deeper into areas such as payments, according to its application. It could also expand the company’s stablecoin business by allowing Coinbase to issue its own stablecoins and help other crypto firms with issuing and managing those tokens, according to people familiar with the matter.

A wave of digital-asset companies have applied for national trust charters and many have received preliminary approval from the OCC during President Donald Trump’s second term. Only a handful have passed the finish line, including Coinbase, Circle Internet Group Inc and Ripple. 

While a trust charter is more limited than a full bank charter, it does weave these OCC-regulated institutions into the infrastructure of Wall Street. Trust banks can’t take ordinary deposits or make loans the way regular lenders do, but they handle other fiduciary and custody services that are core to the financial system.

“Our approval shows that crypto is here to stay and we are building the institutions to match,” Ryan VanGrack, vice chairman at Coinbase, said in an interview. “And it shows we are more connected to our federal regulatory infrastructure, something we’ve long championed. That’s precisely how crypto gets integrated into our financial system.”

The OCC did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication.

Coinbase is already the world’s biggest crypto custodian, according to chief executive Brian Armstrong. Even before receiving the OCC charter, it’s been expanding its presence in payments and stablecoins, which are cryptocurrencies that mimic other assets including the US dollar.

The company recently partnered with Citigroup Inc for fiat-to-stablecoin conversions. It then teamed up with Ripple last month to bring that company’s stablecoin to Coinbase’s platforms. Coinbase also shares revenue with Circle for its USDC token, the second-largest stablecoin in circulation.

The OCC had granted Coinbase conditional approval for its charter in April. Coinbase was previously regulated on state level.

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