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Ripple Secures Final US Bank Approval and Expands BNY Partnership
- The OCC granted final approval for Ripple National Trust Bank, allowing it to manage RLUSD reserves and provide fiduciary digital asset custody services.
- The specialised bank cannot accept ordinary deposits or offer traditional loans, while RLUSD issuance remains with Ripple’s New York-regulated subsidiary.
- Ripple expanded its partnership with BNY to support direct RLUSD minting and redemption, XRP custody and tokenised financing solutions.
- XRP rose 2.6% to US$1.32 following the announcements, outperforming Bitcoin and Ethereum over the same 24-hour period.
Ripple has received final approval to establish a national trust bank. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) gave the green light for what’s called the Ripple National Trust Bank (RNTB) on 26 October.
This doesn’t make Ripple a classic full-service bank but rather gives it a specialised banking subsidiary. While it’s a genuine federally chartered banking institution, what it can offer is quite different from a standard bank.
Ripple National Trust Bank will manage the reserves backing RLUSD, oversee those assets on behalf of stablecoin holders and provide digital asset custody services to institutional clients.
What it can’t do is offer savings and current accounts, accept ordinary customer deposits, provide traditional loans or offer FDIC-insured deposit accounts.
RLUSD will continue to be issued by Ripple’s existing New York-regulated subsidiary, Standard Custody & Trust Company.
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said that banks and crypto “work better together” and called the OCC approval a practical example of this. He also highlighted the years Ripple has spent building what he called “regulated financial infrastructure”.
A national trust charter gives us an even stronger foundation for RLUSD and the institutional products we’re building across payments, custody and capital markets.
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse Deepening Collaboration in Tokenisation
Just a day after the OCC announcement, Ripple also said in a statement that it is expanding a strategic partnership with financial services provider BNY. Ripple will bring to the table its XRP Ledger (XRPL) and other “digital asset solutions”, while BNY contributes its “scale, servicing model and digital capabilities”.
Related: Major US Companies Object to Tokenised Stock Trading on OKX-ICE Platform
BNY already holds reserves backing RLUSD and now also supports custody of XRP and RLUSD on its Digital Asset Custody platform.
Looking beyond the PR jargon, BNY plans to allow clients to mint and redeem RLUSD directly through BNY. It also intends to broaden its custody support for investment products issued on the XRPL.
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Ripple and BNY, together with C2FO, are also looking at how blockchain-based financing of business receivables could work.
Ripple president Monica Long said it’s no longer about onchain asset issuance but rather letting institutions use tokenised assets for “payments and collateral across financial markets”.
With BNY, we’re connecting the necessary components of financial infrastructure on the XRP Ledger so institutions can move from holding digital assets to using them within capital markets and trade finance seamlessly.
Ripple president Monica Long XRP also gained following the announcements, outperforming Bitcoin and Ethereum. At the time of writing, it traded at US$1.32 (AU$1.87), up 2.6% over 24 hours, compared with gains of 1–2% for BTC and ETH.
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Author
Aaron Feuerstein
Aaron Feuerstein is a freelance writer based in Melbourne. His focus is on decentralised finance and the regulatory space surrounding blockchain. He holds a Master's in Accounting. When he is not studying the latest legal case, he enjoys his time as a modest but eager hobby cook.
