Morgan Stanley applies for a U.S. trust bank charter…seeking to expand crypto custody and staking

Morgan Stanley has applied for a U.S. federal trust bank charter as it looks to expand custody of virtual assets (cryptocurrencies) and related services.

According to Bloomberg on the 27th (local time), Morgan Stanley filed an application on the 18th with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) to establish a new (de novo) national trust bank. The filing says the entity plans to offer crypto custody services and also support trading and staking functions for investment clients. The headquarters will be in Purchase, New York, while services will be operated nationwide across the United States.

Morgan Stanley has recently been expanding its digital-asset business. In January, it created a new head-of-crypto strategy role and appointed Amy Oldenburg to the position. It is also pursuing applications related to exchange-traded funds (ETFs) for Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH) and Solana (SOL), and is working with Zerohash to expand support for digital-asset trading for E*TRADE customers.

Wall Street financial firms have been stepping up access to the crypto market amid shifts in the regulatory environment. As the Donald Trump administration has signaled a more favorable stance toward the digital-asset industry, not only related companies but also traditional financial institutions are increasingly looking to enter the space directly by obtaining trust bank charters.

Meanwhile, some in the banking industry have raised concerns over consumer protection and financial stability as crypto firms apply for trust bank charters. The OCC says the framework has the effect of bringing such entities into a federal direct-supervision regime.