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TL;DR
- Bastion has received conditional OCC approval to form a national trust bank.
- The charter is non-depository and geared toward custody and digital asset services.
- The company still has pre-opening conditions to satisfy before it can fully operate.
Bastion is moving closer to operating under a federal banking charter after receiving conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
The OCC’s Corporate Decision 1391, dated September 18, gives Bastion National Trust Bank — still in formation — permission to move ahead with a national trust structure built around custody and digital asset services.
This is not the same thing as Bastion suddenly becoming a conventional deposit-taking bank.
The charter is specifically a non-depository national trust bank.
Why The Charter Matters
For digital asset companies, federal trust charters have become increasingly important because they offer a clearer regulatory framework for institutional custody.
Large funds, corporates and financial institutions generally want more than a wallet provider and a promise.
They want governance, fiduciary standards, audits, regulatory oversight and clearly defined custody responsibilities.
A national trust charter gives companies like Bastion a route into that market under OCC supervision.
The approval also covers digital asset payment-clearing activities, which could make the charter useful beyond straightforward asset storage.
Conditional Means Conditional
There is still another step.
Bastion has to satisfy the OCC’s usual pre-opening requirements before the bank can begin operating under the charter.
That can include capital, systems, management, compliance and operational readiness requirements.
So this is a significant regulatory milestone, but not the end of the process.
The bigger trend is familiar.
Crypto infrastructure that once sat almost entirely outside traditional banking regulation is steadily moving inside it.
Custody firms want trust charters. Exchanges want derivatives registrations. Stablecoin issuers want payment licenses.
Bastion’s approval is another example of that convergence.
Source: Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. https://www.occ.gov/topics/charters-and-licensing/interpretations-and-actions/2026/corporate-decision-1391.pdf
This article was written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
