Coinbase’s Federal Charter Takes Effect on November 6 as PNC Begins USDC Payments Pilot
Key Facts
Coinbase National Trust Company’s charter took effect on November 6, 2026, after approval by the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency on April 2, as Coinbase announced on November 9 that it had begun a pilot program with PNC Bank to accept USDC payments from eligible commercial and institutional banking clients. The developments combine Coinbase’s expansion of its digital asset custody business under federal oversight with a test of stablecoin use in commercial payments through a U.S. bank. The OCC’s decision identifies the entity as a national trust bank and requires it to limit its operations to trust company activities and related activities. The agency also approved the bank’s provision of cryptocurrency custody in a fiduciary capacity. Coinbase said final approval would allow it to expand its custody business within a federal regulatory framework.
Under the PNC pilot, eligible clients receive USDC payments, which the service then automatically converts at a 1 to 1 ratio into U.S. dollars and deposits into a designated deposit account at the bank. Coinbase Payment APIs provide the stablecoin payments infrastructure, while PNC provides banking and treasury management services. Coinbase’s announcement did not specify which network would be used in the program or the number of participating clients or expected payment volume. PNC described the initiative as a test of stablecoin benefits with clients. The bank’s head of treasury said: "For now, this is about testing and learning with our clients."
The companies said the service could accelerate businesses’ access to funds and improve the speed of cross-border transactions, noting that stablecoins can be sent and received almost instantly. The pilot places stablecoin collection within banking arrangements in which PNC receives dollars into clients’ designated accounts. According to the companies’ announcement, the program remains a pilot and is available to an eligible group of commercial and institutional banking clients. The parties did not announce a timeline for expanding the service or details about the scope of its use. PNC is thereby testing a route that links incoming stablecoin payments to dollar deposits through the bank’s services and treasury management.
Some of the cooperation between the companies dates to the previous year, when PNC tapped Coinbase to offer cryptocurrency trading to its clients through a crypto-asset services platform, according to Reuters. The news agency also said PNC would provide banking services to Coinbase. In the charter decision, the OCC said Coinbase is wholly owned by the new entity and that fiduciary digital asset custody services would be offered primarily to institutional clients. The decision also provided for the transfer of current custody operations to the bank during a three-year regulatory period. Coinbase said it has had experience in large-scale digital asset custody for more than 14 years.
When it announced conditional approval in April, Coinbase explained that the charter did not make it a commercial bank and said it would not accept retail deposits or engage in fractional-reserve banking. The OCC decision said the bank would not be a deposit-taking institution insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and that Community Reinvestment Act requirements did not apply to it under the decision. The agency received five comments on the application, including two from groups representing banks and three from community groups. The OCC concluded that the proposed activities were permissible for a national trust bank. The charter’s limits, as set out by the agency, remain tied to trust operations and related activities.
Coinbase shares closed at $136.1 on November 9, 2026, compared with $134.76 on November 6, according to EL7 data. This puts the stock’s performance between the closing price on the day the charter took effect and the close on the day the expanded partnership with PNC was announced. The session’s high and low prices on November 9 were not verified from a reliable, open source. PNC’s announcement came three days after the federal charter took effect. The next announced step is to implement the pilot program and test the service with eligible clients.