- Scope of proposed operations
- Increasing digital asset technique: Bitcoin, Solana and XRP
Morgan Stanley has submitted an utility to determine a nationwide digital asset belief financial institution, marking one other step within the agency’s increasing involvement within the crypto sector.
In response to a public itemizing from the Workplace of the Comptroller of the Foreign money (OCC), the financial institution acquired Morgan Stanley’s utility on February 18, 2026.
The proposed entity, named Morgan Stanley Digital Belief, Nationwide Affiliation (MSDTNA), would function as a federally chartered belief establishment targeted on digital asset companies. The OCC has revealed non-confidential parts of the marketing strategy.
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Scope of proposed operations
The submitting outlines plans for the belief financial institution to offer custody companies for sure digital belongings, together with execution of purchases, gross sales, swaps, and transfers to help shopper funding actions. The entity would additionally facilitate fiduciary staking companies on behalf of purchasers.
Whereas the belief’s primary workplace can be situated in Buy, New York, the companies are supposed to be provided nationwide, topic to regulatory approval.
Nationwide belief financial institution charters from the OCC permit establishments to function beneath federal supervision slightly than counting on a patchwork of state-level licenses. For crypto-focused corporations, this construction can present a standardized compliance framework for custody and fiduciary actions.
Morgan Stanley’s utility follows a wave of conditional approvals issued by the OCC in late 2025 and early 2026.
In December 2025, the regulator granted conditional approval for crypto-focused nationwide belief charters to: Circle (First Nationwide Digital Foreign money Financial institution), Ripple (Ripple Nationwide Belief Financial institution), BitGo, Constancy Digital Belongings, Paxos Belief Firm.
In February, three further corporations acquired conditional approval: Stripe (Bridge Nationwide Belief Financial institution), Crypto.com and Protego.
With Morgan Stanley’s submitting, together with pending purposes from Coinbase and World Liberty Monetary, the variety of establishments pursuing OCC crypto belief constructions continues to develop.
Increasing digital asset technique: Bitcoin, Solana and XRP
The belief financial institution utility is a part of a broader digital asset enlargement at Morgan Stanley.
In January, the agency appointed Amy Oldenburg to a newly created position overseeing digital asset technique. It has additionally filed purposes for exchange-traded funds monitoring Bitcoin, Ethereum (Ether), and Solana.
Moreover, Morgan Stanley partnered with Zerohash to allow digital asset buying and selling for purchasers of its E*Commerce platform, increasing retail entry to crypto markets via its brokerage channel.
If accredited, Morgan Stanley Digital Belief would supply the agency with a federally regulated construction to custody digital belongings, execute transactions, and supply staking companies inside a fiduciary framework. Such capabilities might place the financial institution to serve institutional and high-net-worth purchasers searching for built-in crypto publicity inside a standard monetary establishment.
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RippleNet makes use of XRP as a bridge forex to course of cross-border funds in seconds. The standard SWIFT system, then again, can take a number of days, is pricey, fragmented, and closely depending on middleman banks.
Morgan Stanley not directly confirms the narrative that Ripple has been pursuing for years: that XRP isn’t just a cryptocurrency, however a technological instrument for rising effectivity in world funds.
Amy Oldenburg, Morgan Stanley’s head of digital belongings technique, appeared February 24–25 on the Bitcoin For Companies convention in Las Vegas. In a hearth chat with Technique CEO Phong Le, Oldenburg agreed with Le’s assertion that “if there was an organization that would ‘orange capsule’ the world, it will be Morgan Stanley.”
On January 6, 2026, the agency filed an S-1 for a Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Belief ETF, together with related merchandise for ether and Solana. In October 2025 it eliminated prior restrictions on what kind of purchasers might spend money on exchange-traded merchandise (ETPs), permitting monetary advisors to supply cryptocurrency funds to all purchasers in any account kind, together with retirement accounts.
Beforehand, solely purchasers with a minimum of $1.5 million in asssets and an aggresive danger tolerance could possibly be offered crypto ETPs.