On April 1, 2026, EDX Markets Holding Company—the entity behind the institutional cryptocurrency exchange backed by Charles Schwab, Citadel Securities, Fidelity Digital Assets, and others—filed an application with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) to organize EDX Trust, National Association as a de novo national trust bank in Chicago. The application was made public on Wednesday, April 1, and first reported by Bloomberg.
Scope of Services: Custody, Asset Management, and Settlement
The proposed bank seeks full fiduciary powers under 12 U.S.C. § 92a and authorization to provide digital asset custody, asset management, and settlement services exclusively for institutional clients. Its proposed main office is located at 200 W. Madison, Suite 1450, Chicago, IL 60606. EDX Markets launched in June 2023 as a non-custodial institutional crypto exchange, meaning it does not hold client funds during trading. The proposed trust bank would not alter this separation: EDX Trust would handle custody, asset management, and settlement, while order matching and trading would remain with affiliate EDX Markets LLC.
If approved, EDX Trust would offer fiduciary custody of digital assets, cash, and stablecoins, using sub-custodian banks to manage private keys and reduce single points of failure. The bank would also manage custodied cash and stablecoins by investing them in highly liquid assets, targeting returns near the federal funds rate, along with permissible staking and yield-generating activities. Settlement services would include riskless principal trading and end-of-day net settlement for clients operating on the EDX Markets platform or over-the-counter (OTC) venues. The bank would not engage in proprietary trading.
Leadership and Governance
The proposed board includes five members, among them independents with banking and risk backgrounds from First Business Financial, UBS, and Charles Schwab. Management draws from executives who have worked at Cboe Digital, the Options Clearing Corporation, Coinbase, and Kraken. CEO José Antonio Acuña-Rohter, who previously led ErisX and Cboe Digital, is heading the effort. The bank will have no physical branches and no retail services—all operations will run electronically through APIs and a graphical interface.
Broader Trend: OCC Scrutiny of Crypto Trust Banks
EDX Trust joins a growing list of crypto and fintech firms seeking national trust bank charters since late 2025. In December 2025, the OCC granted conditional approvals to five crypto-related institutions, including de novo charters for Ripple National Trust Bank and First National Digital Currency Bank, along with conversions for Bitgo, Fidelity Digital Assets, and Paxos. Early 2026 saw additional approvals for Crypto.com and Stripe’s Bridge unit. Pending applications as of April 1 include Revolut Bank US, Zerohash National Trust Bank, Morgan Stanley Digital Trust, Coinbase National Trust Company, and World Liberty Trust Company (linked to the Trump family).
A new OCC final rule, effective April 1, 2026, clarifies that national trust banks may engage in operations of a trust company and activities related to non-fiduciary digital asset custody on a case-by-case basis. This removes a layer of legal ambiguity that had slowed institutional adoption. A federal charter allows a firm to operate nationwide under a single regulatory framework, bypassing most state-by-state licensing requirements—a critical advantage for institutions requiring regulated custody before allocating to digital assets.
The OCC added the EDX Trust application to its public list of pending digital asset licensing applications on March 26. No decision timeline has been announced. Like the others in line, the OCC will review the application for safety and soundness, capital adequacy, and compliance. The application includes a large volume of confidential exhibits (business plan and financial projections) for which EDX has requested FOIA protection.