The Independent Community Bankers of America has sued the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency over a rule that allows cryptocurrency companies to seek national trust bank charters, escalating a dispute over the terms on which digital asset businesses can enter the US banking system.
The trade group filed the case on Friday, October 2, 2026, in the US District Court for the District of Columbia. It is asking the court to revoke the OCC’s recent rule and related guidance, arguing that the regulator has exceeded its authority under the National Bank Act.
The ICBA is one of the largest banking advocacy organisations in the U.S. and typically represents smaller institutions with less than $10 billion in assets. Its challenge centres on a final OCC rule issued on March 2, 2026, which created a route to national trust bank charters for businesses whose activities are not strictly fiduciary in nature, including digital asset activities.
A national charter can give a company a single federal framework in place of a patchwork of state rules. The ICBA argues that the OCC’s approach gives crypto firms the legitimacy of a federal bank charter while allowing them to avoid requirements faced by traditional community banks.
In its complaint, the group said the OCC was asserting “sweeping new powers to charter national trust banks that are not authorized by the National Bank Act.” The ICBA contends that crypto firms obtaining these charters are not subject to the same requirements on capital, liquidity, supervision and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. insurance as traditional banks.
The lawsuit also points to obligations under the Community Reinvestment Act, known as the CRA, and FDIC insurance. The trade body says the new charters allow firms to avoid obligations that apply to traditional banks, leaving crypto trust banks subject to a different level of regulatory oversight from community banks.
Rebecca Romero Rainey, the ICBA’s president and chief executive, said the national trust charter was never intended to be a “side door” for digital asset companies. She said: “American consumers reasonably expect a federally chartered bank to carry federal protections. Digital assets held at a crypto firm operating under a national trust charter do not carry those important safeguards.”
Rainey said any company whose work is non-fiduciary and which seeks the benefits of a federal bank charter should meet the same standards as community banks. The ICBA says the present system gives digital asset firms an advantage over its members and lacks proper consumer protections.
The OCC has been granting a steady stream of trust charters to crypto firms. World Liberty Financial is listed as a recent addition among firms receiving such charters. Coinbase National Trust and Ripple are among the charter applications opposed by the ICBA.
The trade group has objected to crypto charter applications since at least 2025. It also previously opposed the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act in the U.S. Senate, arguing that the legislation’s stablecoin provisions did not protect community banks from direct competition with deposit accounts that are central to their businesses.
The case now puts before the court the ICBA’s argument that the OCC lacks the legal power to issue the challenged charters for non-fiduciary digital asset businesses. The brief does not state the OCC’s response to the lawsuit, a timetable for the case or how the court may rule.
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