The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said on August 11, 2026, that it has received 40 applications for new bank charters over the past 18 months, a sharp break from the early 2010s, when it saw fewer than four a year. The statement came a day after the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation overhauled how it reviews deposit insurance applications, and the OCC used it to welcome the change. For payment companies weighing a charter of their own, the two moves shorten the stretch of time founders spend committing money without knowing whether they will get a bank at the end of it.
Opening a bank in the US takes two separate approvals. The charter comes from a chartering authority: the OCC for a national bank, or a state regulator. Deposit insurance comes from the FDIC. The two applications run in parallel, and for 15 years the FDIC side has set the pace.
The OCC says its charter pipeline has reopened
The OCC describes a turnaround in the numbers. From 2011 through 2014, it received fewer than four charter applications a year on average, and none at all in some years. The 40 applications of the past 18 months include filings for national trust banks. In many cases, the agency says, it decided within 120 days of receiving a complete application. And for the first time in five years, a full-service national bank received final OCC approval and opened.
The FDIC now gives a first answer within 120 days
The FDIC is targeting the order of operations. Until now, organizers had to raise capital, hire staff, and build infrastructure before learning whether they would get deposit insurance. The new process, announced on August 10, splits the review into two phases and moves the first decision much earlier.
| Phase | What the FDIC reviews | Stated timeline | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phase 1 | Detailed business plan, financial projections, ownership and organizational structure (including any foreign ownership), and the planned capital raise | 120 days after filing | Contingent authorization |
| Phase 2 | Execution: capital raised, staff hired, infrastructure and other start-up work completed | Within 12 months of contingent authorization | Final approval |
| Opening | Confirmation that all pre-opening conditions have been met | When the institution is ready to open | FDIC affirmation |
The two-phase approach applies to applications received after August 15, 2026. The FDIC expects that, with some exceptions, applicants will be able to file with it and with their federal or state chartering authority at the same time, and it says it will coordinate with that authority to avoid duplicated work. That is the point the OCC emphasized: the FDIC’s two-phase sequence now matches the one the OCC already runs.
A charter lets payment firms cut out the sponsor bank
Most US payment companies operate without a license of their own. They rely on a partner bank, known as a sponsor bank, that holds the accounts, issues the cards, and manages the relationship with the card networks. That arrangement brings cost, dependency, and concentration risk, as several failures of intermediary platforms have shown. A charter of their own changes the math.
- Direct network access: a chartered institution connects to Visa and Mastercard without an intermediary and negotiates its own terms.
- More of the margin: revenue now shared with the sponsor bank (deposits, interchange, float) stays in-house.
- Less dependency: the service no longer depends on the risk appetite of a single partner.
- The trade-off: capital requirements, governance, compliance, and ongoing supervision, with a fixed cost the sponsor model avoided.
Payment and digital asset companies have been filing for charters at a faster clip for several months, with mixed results: denials, conditional approvals, national trust charters with limited powers, and state charters built for fintechs. The August 10 reform does not change the substantive criteria. It changes when founders take on the risk.
Some incumbent US banks dispute that a faster review can be just as rigorous. The OCC points to the deadlines it has met and to the full-service bank that has actually opened. The real test will be the first full cycle of applications reviewed under the new process, which will not be complete before late 2027.