Stablecoin infrastructure provider Bastion has received preliminary conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) for a US national trust bank charter, according to a company news release published on Friday.

The charter layers federal supervision by the OCC — an independent bureau of the US Treasury Department that charters and regulates national banks — on top of the state licenses Bastion already holds. Unlike a conventional commercial bank, however, the proposed entity cannot accept deposits or make loans. That limited scope reflects the design of national trust charters, which are custody-centered institutions rather than full-service lenders. The appeal for crypto firms is consolidated oversight: a single national supervisor with jurisdiction across state lines, an alternative to approvals secured separately in each state. Conditional approval is also an intermediate stage — the OCC grants it before an institution opens, with final approval following once its conditions are met.

Operating under the name Bastion Platforms National Trust Company, the unit will provide stablecoin custody and wallets, payment infrastructure, and white-label issuance from a single federally regulated entity.

"Stablecoins have moved from emerging technology into core financial infrastructure, and that requires a different standard of trust, governance and regulatory rigor," said Nassim Eddequiouaq, CEO of Bastion.

The company has been pursuing federal oversight since acquiring its New York trust charter in February 2025, a state-level authorization that preceded its federal push.

Bastion raised $14.6 million in a funding round led by Coinbase Ventures, Cointelegraph reported in September 2025, with participation from Sony, the investment subsidiary of Samsung, the crypto arm of venture capital (VC) firm Andreessen Horowitz, and crypto VC firm Hashed.

Bastion joins a growing roster of crypto firms seeking federal charters. Ripple has received conditional approval for a similar charter, while Circle and BitGo have secured final charter approvals. Kraken parent Payward, crypto infrastructure provider Zerohash, and payments company Block have also submitted applications, Cointelegraph has reported. The staggered statuses — Bastion and Ripple at the conditional stage, Circle and BitGo already final, and Payward, Zerohash and Block at the application stage — show the process in motion, with Bastion's path to a final charter still ahead.