Coinbase Global has received conditional approval from banking regulators for a national trust company charter, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday, in a move that could enhance the appeal of the largest American cryptocurrency exchange among large institutional investors.
Full approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency would allow Coinbase to operate as a federally regulated cryptocurrency custodian.
Greg Tusar, the company’s vice president of product management, told Bloomberg in an interview that a complete agreement could also help the company offer new products such as tokenized securities and enable it to issue stablecoins.
“The ability to have a federal framework for our custody business is important,” Tusar told Bloomberg. “This is about expanding our reach and being able to pursue new activities that we might not have been able to pursue before.”
Coinbase did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters.
The United States has taken a more cryptocurrency-friendly approach since the election of President Donald Trump, with regulators easing previous restrictions and reducing enforcement measures.
Earlier this year, Crypto.com also received conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for a national trust bank charter.
