Crypto companies seeking a US federal bank charter should be treated no differently than other financial institutions, says Jonathan Gould, the head of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).
“There is simply no justification for considering digital assets differently,” he added. “Additionally, it is important that we do not confine banks, including current national trust banks, to the technologies or businesses of the past.”
Crypto “should have” a way to supervision
Gould said that the banking system has the “capacity to evolve from the telegraph to the blockchain.”
“Chartering helps ensure that the banking system continues to keep pace with the evolution of finance and supports our modern economy,” he added. “That is why entities that engage in activities involving digital assets and other novel technologies should have a pathway to become federally supervised banks.”
Gould brushes off banks’ concerns
“Such concerns risk reversing innovations that would better serve bank customers and support local economies,” he said. “The OCC has also had years of experience supervising a crypto-native national trust bank.”
Gould said the regulator was “hearing from existing national banks, on a near daily basis, about their own initiatives for exciting and innovative products and services.”
“All of this reinforces my confidence in the OCC’s ability to effectively supervise new entrants as well as new activities of existing banks in a fair and even-handed manner,” he added.
