Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC)
US federal regulator within the Treasury Department; charters, regulates, and supervises all national banks and federal savings associations including national trust banks. Recently issued national trust bank charters to digital-asset custodians like BitGo.
What it is
The OCC (Office of the Comptroller of the Currency) is a bureau of the US Treasury Department with statutory authority to charter, regulate, and supervise all national banks and federal savings associations in the United States. Its authority derives from the National Bank Act of 1864 and subsequent amendments. For the digital-asset domain, OCC-issued national trust bank charters (OCC national trust bank charter) have emerged as a federal-level regulatory path for institutional custody vendors that complements (and in some cases supersedes) state-level trust charters.
How it shows up in sources
- BitGo public homepage (fetched April 2026) — BitGo's public homepage announces OCC approval to convert to a federally chartered national trust bank. Footer disclosure identifies BitGo Bank & Trust, National Association as "a national trust bank chartered and regulated by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC)."
Vendors / people associated
- BitGo — BitGo Bank & Trust, National Association is OCC-chartered.
- Forward references in this wiki: Anchorage Digital, Paxos National Trust, and other digital-asset custodians have historically received OCC charters; their specific status is not addressed in current sources.
Concepts associated
- OCC national trust bank charter — the federal-level regulatory primitive.
- Qualified custodian — OCC-chartered national trust banks generally satisfy the SEC's qualified-custodian definition.
- Counterparty-graph research — OCC is a federal regulator counterparty for vendors holding national trust bank charters.
Open questions
- OCC interpretive guidance on digital assets. The OCC has issued multiple Interpretive Letters on digital-asset banking activities (notably 1170 from 2020 on custody, 1172 on stablecoin reserves, 1174 on payments, plus subsequent guidance). None of these are currently in the wiki; future ingest of OCC interpretive guidance would substantively develop the regulator-side framework for digital-asset banking.
- List of OCC-chartered digital-asset trust banks. Unlike NYDFS, the OCC does not publish a single consolidated list at the homepage level (chartered institutions are listed in the OCC's Financial Institution Search). Future ingest of the OCC's institution lookup would establish the regulator-side source of truth for OCC-chartered digital-asset vendors.