The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has rejected Wise’s application for a U.S. national trust bank charter, the payments company announced on Friday, an unusual public rejection from the regulator, which has spent the past eight months approving trust charters for crypto and fintech companies.
Wise shares fell as much as 10% on the Nasdaq, and the company moved its primary listing from London in May.
According to Law360, which reviewed the letter, the OCC’s decision said the application raised “serious supervisory and compliance concerns” and that Wise’s proposed management and board “demonstrated a sustained inability” to manage money laundering and terrorist financing risks.
Wise said it plans to file a new application “under the framework of the GENIUS Act in order to continue to maintain good relations with our company,” and that the denial does not affect its U.S. operations, which operate under a money transmitter license across 48 states and four territories.
Application is overtaken by an event
In June 2025, Wise filed to form Wise National Trust (NA), a non-depository trust bank with direct access to the Federal Reserve’s clearing rails instead of going through partner banks. A month later, U.S. state regulators issued multiple state consent orders against Wise for noncompliance, an action the company acknowledged in a statement Friday.
This application also relied on the Fed’s master account. “The Federal Reserve’s general suspension of account access for uninsured trust banks makes the approach in our application unworkable,” Wise said.
Bank lobby groups have advocated veto, with the Bank Policy Institute and the Independent Community Bankers of America both filing letters in October opposing the charter. According to Finance Magnates, Belgian authorities opened a money laundering investigation against Wise in June over suspicious transactions amounting to approximately $500 million.
Charter wave outlier
This denial contradicts the OCC’s recent record under Audit Jonathan Gould. The agency granted conditional approval to Circle, Ripple, Paxos, BitGo, and Fidelity Digital Assets in December, followed by Coinbase in April. Circle received final approval to open the National Trust Bank on July 10th.
More than a dozen applications are pending at the OCC, including those from World Liberty Financial’s trust company, Revolut, and Kraken’s parent company, PayWord. Wise no longer appears on your hold list.
Wise said the company’s infrastructure is “well positioned to play a critical interoperability role” as stablecoins proliferate alongside existing payment rails. The company reported more than $240 billion in cross-border transaction volume and approximately 19 million customers in fiscal 2026.
