ICBA lawsuit tests whether the OCC can charter non-fiduciary crypto trusts at all

The Independent Community Bankers of America is asking a federal court to decide a narrow but consequential question: whether the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has any legal power to grant national trust charters to firms that do no fiduciary work, including crypto custodians.

The group filed suit against the OCC on October 2, 2026, arguing in a statement announcing the case that the regulator is exercising powers not authorized by the National Bank Act. The target is a final rule the OCC issued on March 2, 2026, which extended national trust charters to cover non-fiduciary custody arrangements, the category that covers most digital asset custody businesses. The case is filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia.

The complaint, filed publicly by the community banking group, frames the rule as a self-granted expansion. In its words, the OCC claimed sweeping new powers to charter national trust banks that are not authorized by the National Bank Act. Trust charters were built for fiduciary businesses, where the bank holds assets and owes duties to beneficiaries. Under the March rule, a company can hold a trust charter while conducting ordinary commercial custody with no such duty, which the group says lets charter holders borrow the credibility of a federal bank charter without the obligations that come with one.

“Congress did not create the national trust charter as a side door into the banking system for crypto firms seeking the credibility of a federal bank charter,” ICBA president Rebeca Romero Rainey said in the group’s statement.

ICBA also argues the charter structure creates a regulatory arbitrage. It contends firms holding these charters can avoid Community Reinvestment Act obligations and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp coverage, and that uninsured entities could use them to sidestep state consumer protections.

The broader banking industry has lined up behind uniform standards rather than endorsing the suit. The Bank Policy Institute supports bringing new products into the regulated banking system, its regulatory affairs head Paige Pidano Paridon said, provided that entities doing those activities face the same rules as every other chartered institution.

That framing is the industry’s answer to the suit’s central question: the dispute is not whether crypto firms belong in banking, but whether the OCC can rewrite what a trust charter means on its own. A ruling for ICBA would unwind the March rule and stall pending charter applications, including Coinbase National Trust and Ripple. A ruling for the OCC would confirm that trust charters are available to non-fiduciary custody businesses without new legislation.

The OCC declined to comment, saying it does not comment on litigation.