Block Inc. applied to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency on Sept. 8 for a specialized federal charter to form Builders Bank Trust, N.A. an uninsured national trust bank focused on digital asset custody and fiduciary services.
The proposed institution will custody and manage bitcoin and stablecoins without taking deposits or extending credit. Lee Woolley, Block's digital asset strategy lead, is slated to become president and CEO. Woolley previously led the Treasury Department Federal Credit Union and held senior roles at Northern Trust and BNY Mellon.
The federal charter would consolidate Block's existing custody operations under a single supervisory structure, replacing a patchwork of state licenses. The company currently operates Square Financial Services, an industrial bank, and has built digital asset infrastructure across its payments division.
"This charter leverages Block's digital asset experience, our existing banking infrastructure, and our team's regulatory background," Woolley said.
The move places Block among a rising cohort of fintech and crypto firms pursuing national trust or limited-purpose bank charters. The OCC has received dozens of de novo applications in recent months and granted conditional or final approvals to Circle, Ripple, BitGo and Paxos.
National trust charters permit custody and fiduciary work on a nationally uniform basis without deposit insurance or lending authority—a key advantage for companies scaling across state lines. Regulators have signaled openness to integrating digital-asset activities within the federal banking perimeter when legally permissible, bringing these operations under established oversight rather than leaving them outside traditional financial regulation.
The application remains subject to OCC review. Block's current services are unaffected by the filing; approval would formalize and scale a subset of existing custody operations under federal banking rules.
