OCC Clears Anchorage Digital After Crypto Scrutiny

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has terminated a 3-year-old enforcement action against Anchorage Digital Bank, the first federally chartered cryptocurrency-focused bank.

The April 21, 2022, consent order addressed the bank’s failure to adopt and implement required Bank Secrecy Act and anti-money laundering measures, the OCC said in a Thursday (Aug. 21) press release.

In a Monday (Aug. 18) order terminating the consent order, the OCC said it “believes that the safety and soundness of the Bank and its compliance with laws and regulations does not require the continued existence of the Order.”

Anchorage Digital Co-Founder and CEO Nathan McCauley said in a Tuesday blog post that the lifting of the consent order proves that “crypto and federal oversight are not mutually exclusive — and can in fact be stronger working in tandem.”

McCauley said in the post that when the OCC granted Anchorage Digital a national bank charter on Jan. 13, 2021, making it the first, and still the only, crypto company to gain that status, the company “knew what we were signing up for.”

The path for a crypto company was uncharted, and many felt that digital assets and regulation were “like oil and water,” McCauley said.

“In the 1,681 days that have since passed, we have built what has become the world’s most regulated digital asset bank, investing immense resources into products and people who would come to define the industry standard for crypto compliance,” McCauley said. “In that time, we received — and have now resolved — feedback from regulators as we set the standard for federally chartered custody of digital assets.”

“But these 1,681 days are not defined by a single regulatory action, but rather by the hundreds of thousands of man-hours in risk and regulatory specialization, tens of millions of dollars in compliance infrastructure investment, hundreds of dedicated meetings with our regulator, dozens of expert hires, and annual OCC exams — all in service of the nation’s first-of-its-kind federal banking charter,” McCauley said.

When the OCC announced the consent order in 2022, Michael J. Hsu, who was acting comptroller of the currency at the time, said: “The OCC holds all nationally chartered banks to the same high standards, whether they engage in traditional or novel activities. When institutions fall short, we will take action and hold them accountable to ensure compliance with federal laws and regulations.”