EDX Markets, a digital-asset trading venue supported by institutional market participants, has submitted an application to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to be chartered as a national trust bank, according to a public filing disclosed Wednesday.
The filing was made under the regulatory framework established during the Trump administration, which the application noted has exhibited greater openness to firms in the cryptocurrency industry relative to the prior administration.
Should the OCC grant approval, the firm would be authorized to provide custody, asset-management and principal-trading services in addition to continuing to perform order matching on behalf of its customers, the filing said.
EDX is one of several companies pursuing similar trust bank charters under the current regulatory regime. The filing referenced a recent round of conditional approvals in which five cryptocurrency firms, including Circle Internet Group Inc. and Ripple, received conditional trust bank charters in December.
Launched in 2022, EDX was established as a trading platform aimed at accommodating traditional finance participants that are interested in digital assets. The company's website lists institutional backers that include Citadel Securities, Virtu Financial, Fidelity Digital Assets and Hudson River Trading.
For EDX, obtaining a national trust bank charter would formally expand the set of services it could provide to clients by permitting custody and asset-management activities and by enabling principal trading operations, while the platform would continue to perform order matching, as stated in the filing.
EDX's application joins a broader set of filings and conditional approvals under the current OCC approach to crypto-related bank charters. The public filing does not guarantee approval, and it situates EDX within an evolving regulatory landscape that has recently produced conditional authorizations for other crypto firms.
Disclosure: This article was generated with the support of AI and reviewed by an editor.