Jonathan Gould, the new head of the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), told attendees at CoinDesk’s Policy and Regulation event in Washington, D.C., that his office is actively working to stop debanking and to write rules for stablecoins under the GENIUS Act.
Gould described debanking as “real,” saying he continues to hear reports of businesses and corporate accounts being told banks no longer want their business. The OCC this week issued a statement saying it had taken actions “to eliminate politicized or unlawful debanking in the federal banking system.”
The agency has moved quickly on several fronts: reversing what Gould called “anti-crypto licensing conditions,” reorganizing the chartering and licensing function to report directly to his office, and beginning the regulatory drafting required by the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act. Under the law, the OCC will act as a federal regulator for certain U.S. stablecoin issuers and for foreign issuers whose tokens circulate in the U.S.
Gould, a former Bitfury executive, said the OCC is shifting away from a pure risk-elimination approach toward a framework that allows responsible bank participation in crypto markets. He also downplayed concerns that stablecoins will displace traditional deposits, noting that other deposit-like products — such as money market funds — did not eliminate core banking.
What this means: banks and crypto firms should expect formal rulemaking, clearer licensing and supervisory expectations, and closer scrutiny of why banks terminate relationships with crypto customers. The incoming rules will create explicit compliance obligations for stablecoin issuers and raise supervisory standards for banks that choose to serve crypto clients.
For industry participants, the takeaway is that U.S. policy is moving from avoidance toward structured oversight: that should reduce uncertainty for compliant firms but will also increase regulatory responsibilities.
Source: CoinDesk. Read the original coverage for full details.