US regulators move ahead on crypto trust charters as Senate scrutiny grows

Federal regulators are opening more avenues for crypto companies to operate under US rules, while congressional investigators are asking to see the records behind those decisions. Lawmakers want to know how regulators justified new trust charters, how crypto companies handled compliance and what dealings they had with people tied to President Donald Trump’s administration.

On Nov. 9, Coinbase announced that its national trust company had received final approval to open. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency granted preliminary conditional approval in April. The company said the charter gives its custody business a consistent federal framework.

Lawmakers had been questioning how federal regulators were using their existing authority to expand crypto companies’ reach. In a May 18 letter to the OCC, Sen. Elizabeth Warren challenged at least nine crypto trust-charter approvals, including Coinbase’s earlier conditional approval. She asked for the applications, the legal analyses behind the approvals and any related communications between OCC officials and the White House or Trump family.

Four days before Coinbase’s announcement, Sen. Richard Blumenthal renewed demands for records from Binance, Tether and two Trump-linked ventures. He gave them until Jan. 4, 2027, to turn over the requested records voluntarily and warned that his subcommittee could take other steps to obtain them.

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