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Alongside an executive order creating a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has issued new guidance on the crypto-asset activities permissible in the federal banking system.
The executive order, which President Trump issued last week, also authorises the creation of a US Digital Asset Stockpile, consisting of “digital assets other than Bitcoin”.
The US "will not sell” the Bitcoin in the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, the order notes.
The Treasury secretary will develop a strategy for the US Digital Asset Stockpile, which may include potential sales, but this has yet to be confirmed.
The order does not commit the US government to investing public money into Bitcoin, but this idea has not been rejected.
Instead, the Treasury and Commerce Department secretaries have been authorised to develop “budget-neutral” strategies for acquiring additional Bitcoin, provided they impose “no incremental costs” on taxpayers.
With more than 200,000 Bitcoin to its name (currently worth about $16bn), the US government is one of the world’s largest holders of the cryptocurrency.
But, as noted in the executive order, the US previously had “no clear policy” for managing these assets, leading to a lack of accountability and inadequate exploration of options to maximise their value.
David Sacks, the US AI and crypto czar, pointed out that, over the past decade, the country has acquired around 400,000 Bitcoin, but has lost about $17bn in value from selling much of it prematurely.
“We want to have a long-term strategy to maximize the value of these holdings,” he said. “We’ve decided that Bitcoin is scarce, it’s valuable, and it is strategic for the United States to hold on to this as a long-term reserve asset.”
Developing crypto policy
One day after the executive order was issued, President Trump hosted the inaugural White House Crypto Summit, which was attended by Sacks, as well as Treasury secretary Scott Bessent and commerce secretary Howard Lutnick.
It also featured more than a dozen crypto industry leaders, including several other of the world’s largest Bitcoin holders (either in their own right or on behalf of their companies).
These included Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, co-founders of the Gemini exchange; Michael Saylor, executive chair of MicroStrategy; and Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase.
Little came of the summit itself, aside from vague promises from White House staff to use Bitcoin, digital assets and blockchain to “drive America forward” and “remain the leader in the global economy”.
However, on the same day as the summit, the OCC issued new guidance clarifying the range of crypto-asset activities that are permissible in the federal banking system.
In an interpretive letter, the OCC confirmed that crypto-asset custody, certain stablecoin activities and participation in independent node verification networks are permissible for national banks and federal savings associations.
The letter also rescinds the requirement for OCC-supervised institutions to receive supervisory non-objection and demonstrate that they have adequate controls in place before they can engage in these activities.
“The OCC expects banks to have the same strong risk management controls in place to support novel bank activities as they do for traditional ones,” said acting comptroller of the currency Rodney Hood.
“Today’s action will reduce the burden on banks to engage in crypto-related activities, and ensure that these bank activities are treated consistently by the OCC, regardless of the underlying technology.”
The American Bankers Association (ABA) welcomed the OCC’s action, noting that it had opposed the agency’s “atypical” oversight of digital asset activities under the Biden administration.
“Banks have a critical role to play in the digital asset ecosystem, which has the potential to be a catalyst for change in traditional financial markets, and the OCC’s actions today are an important step toward enabling that success," it said.
