Sen. Elizabeth Warren sent a formal letter to OCC Comptroller Jonathan Gould arguing that nine national trust bank charters issued to crypto firms—including Coinbase, Circle, Ripple, Fidelity, and BitGo—violate the National Bank Act and pose 'serious risks' to the U.S. banking system.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren sent a formal letter to OCC Comptroller Jonathan Gould arguing that nine national trust bank charters issued to crypto firms—including Coinbase, Circle, Ripple, Fidelity, and BitGo—violate the National Bank Act and pose 'serious risks' to the U.S. banking system.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) sent a formal oversight letter to Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) Jonathan Gould on Monday, arguing that nine national trust bank charters approved for crypto companies under the Trump administration violate the National Bank Act.
The letter specifically names Coinbase, Circle, Ripple, Paxos, BitGo, Fidelity, Crypto.com, Stripe, and Protego as recipients of charters Warren says were improperly granted. Her core argument: these companies 'look like crypto banks, not trust companies' and their business plans suggest they intend to engage in non-fiduciary activities including payments facilitation, lending, and stablecoin activities 'closely related to deposit-taking.'
Warren requested granular information about the approved charters, whether the OCC allows national trust companies to conduct non-fiduciary activities, and all correspondence between OCC officials and President Trump, his family, and associates regarding crypto charter applications.
The letter also raises conflict-of-interest concerns over a pending application from Trump's World Liberty Financial, which co-founder Zach Witkoff said is 'in the final stages' of receiving conditional OCC approval. Warren and Gould clashed publicly over this application at a February Senate hearing.
This comes as the GENIUS Act stablecoin law, passed last year, has triggered a wave of charter applications from crypto firms seeking to issue, redeem, and custody stablecoins.
If Warren's challenge gains traction, it could freeze or reverse the OCC's crypto banking pipeline—impacting nine already-approved charters and the pending World Liberty Financial application.
What most people miss: This isn't just political theater. Warren is building a legal case that the OCC exceeded its statutory authority under the National Bank Act. If the Senate Banking Committee backs this interpretation, it creates a path to invalidate existing charters—not just block new ones. The request for all Trump-family correspondence signals this could become a broader investigation into regulatory capture at the OCC. For the market, the risk isn't a new regulation—it's the undoing of approvals crypto firms already built business models around.
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