Circle spent more than a year working toward this. The company filed its application with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency back in June 2025, received conditional approval in December, and on July 10, 2026, the OCC granted its final green light to establish First National Digital Currency Bank, N.A. — operating as Circle National Trust. It marks the first time a major stablecoin issuer has obtained a federal banking charter in the United States.
USDC currently circulates at around $73 billion and has become the dominant regulated digital dollar standard across DeFi, corporate settlements, and cross-border payments. Until now, the reserves backing every token were held by third-party custodians. The federal charter changes that: Circle National Trust will manage these assets directly under OCC supervision — the same regulator overseeing JPMorgan and Citibank.
The rollout will be phased. The bank opens initially for fiduciary custody of Circle's own assets and affiliates. From there, a limited group of institutional clients — banks and regulated derivatives clearinghouses — may gain access. Full management of USDC reserves through the new bank is a longer-term objective.
CEO Jeremy Allaire called the approval "a defining step in bringing blockchain technology and digital assets into the core of the U.S. financial system." Markets reacted quickly: Circle's stock jumped 10% in premarket trading, though shares remain down year-to-date.
The timing matters beyond Circle itself. Tether, the market's largest stablecoin issuer with roughly $120 billion in USDT outstanding, holds no comparable banking status in the US. As the GENIUS Act on stablecoin regulation inches toward passage in Congress, the gap between federally-supervised and unsupervised issuers is set to widen. Circle is betting that the future belongs to stablecoin operators embedded within — not alongside — the banking system.
