The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency conditionally approved three national trust charters Friday, including de novos Agora National Trust Bank and Catena Trust Bank, along with Bastion Platforms Trust Co., which sought to convert its state charter to a national license.
The three conditional trust banks-in-organization have been waiting to hear back from the regulator since they submitted their applications in April, May and March, respectively. They join nearly a dozen firms that have nabbed a conditional national trust charter – which allow entities to manage assets and act as fiduciaries, but not to take demand deposits or make loans – since late last year.
Bastion white-labels stablecoins for other firms, as well as oversees custody of reserves and customer wallets. Agora is the issuer of AUSD, a stablecoin first issued in August 2024.
Catena Labs, for its part, is developing financial infrastructure for AI agents, creating what founder Sean Neville has called an “AI-native bank” – something of which stablecoins, he said, would play a big part in the growth story.
Bastion founder Nassim Eddequiouaq wrote in a LinkedIn post Friday that, when he started the company, he expected stablecoins to eventually become core financial infrastructure.
“But for the world’s largest enterprises and financial institutions to adopt them, that infrastructure would need to meet the regulatory standards they already expect from their banks,” Eddequiouaq wrote.
“Stablecoins are moving into the financial mainstream, but institutional adoption depends on infrastructure that can meet an institutional standard,” he wrote. “We made the decision early to build Bastion for that standard. Today is an important validation of that decision, and we’re just getting started.”
Spokespeople from Catena and Agora did not immediately respond to requests for comment on their own conditional approvals.
Full approvals are subject to the satisfaction of conditions set forth by the OCC.
Bastion must maintain a minimum of $6 million in tier 1 capital. At least $3 million or 50% of its tier 1 capital (whichever is greater) must be held in eligible liquid assets for its first three years of operation, according to the OCC.
Both Agora and Catena must maintain a minimum of $10 million in tier 1 capital. Each must hold at least $5 million or 50% of their tier 1 capital (whichever is greater) in eligible liquid assets for its first three years of operation, according to the OCC.
Each bank must also maintain 180 days of operating expenses in eligible liquid assets for those three years.
The OCC has received dozens of de novo charter applications in the past 18 months.
“The charter is the regulatory layer that makes all of that possible at scale,” Agora CEO Nick van Eck wrote in a blog post when Agora applied for a trust charter in April. “Operating without a U.S. federal charter means renting the rails in the world’s most important financial market.”
The regulator recently denied two applications, including British fintech Wise’s national trust charter application in July, which it rejected in part because organizers didn’t demonstrate “sufficient familiarity” with federal banking laws and regulations.
