Wise regroups under GENIUS Act after US regulator rejects trust bank bid
OCC cites AML failings in blocking Wise's Austin trust charter; London-listed shares fall as fintech pivots to US stablecoin licensing route.
Wise has confirmed it will file a fresh application for a US national trust bank charter under the GENIUS Act, after the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency rejected its original bid citing anti-money-laundering shortcomings and inexperienced management. The London-listed payments group disclosed the rejection on 24 July, three days after the regulator’s decision, sending its shares down as much as 10%.
The setback marks a significant reversal for a company that has spent more than a year seeking direct access to US dollar clearing infrastructure, and it illustrates the growing regulatory complexity facing fintechs that want to sit inside, rather than alongside, the American banking system.
Regulator points to compliance gaps
The OCC’s ruling found that Wise had not demonstrated the proposed entity, Wise National Trust, could meet US legal and regulatory standards, according to both crypto.news and The Block. The regulator flagged weaknesses in anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorist-financing controls, alongside a record of Wise US falling short of rules that apply to money services businesses.
The OCC also questioned whether the proposed directors and managers had sufficient grounding in national banking law, fiduciary services and AML/CFT operations, and noted that the planned bank would have leaned heavily on Wise US and other group entities for compliance functions rather than building independent capability. The Austin-based trust bank had been designed to offer multi-currency stored-value accounts, payment processing and fiduciary services.
Wise said it had already strengthened its financial-crime controls since the original filing and would address the OCC’s findings directly in its next submission. The company stressed that its existing US operations, run through money-transmitter licences across 48 states and four territories, continue unaffected.
A pivot forced by the Federal Reserve, not just the OCC
Wise’s decision to change tack is rooted as much in Federal Reserve policy as in the OCC’s verdict. The company’s original June 2025 filing depended on securing direct access to Federal Reserve payment systems, a route it says has become unworkable while the central bank reviews its stance on account access for uninsured trust banks.
“With the Federal Reserve generally pausing account access for an uninsured trust bank, the approach in our application became non-viable,” Wise said.
The company will instead pursue a charter under the GENIUS Act, the federal framework enacted in July 2025 that established licensing and supervision for payment stablecoin issuers. Wise has not indicated it intends to launch its own stablecoin, and analysts at William Blair said they expect the firm to remain, in their words, “agnostic of the rail” — prioritising cheaper cross-border transfers over any particular settlement technology, whether that is traditional correspondent banking or blockchain-based rails.
What it signals for stablecoin licensing
The rejection does not bar Wise from reapplying once it has addressed the OCC’s concerns, and the company has said it intends to do exactly that. But the episode underscores how unsettled the practical mechanics of the GENIUS Act remain a year after its passage, with the Federal Reserve still working through how uninsured entities should access core payment infrastructure.
For a UK-headquartered, London-listed group, the outcome highlights the regulatory friction that even well-capitalised international payments firms face in securing a federal US banking charter, and adds to a broader pattern of scrutiny facing non-bank entities seeking direct access to dollar clearing under the new stablecoin regime.
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