The Wild Ride of Banks and Cryptos Crashing into the US Like a Herd of Digital Elephants

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It seems the crypto creatures and their banking cousins have decided to throw a raucous shindig on the grand American financial stage, just as the Trump administration tries to slap some rules on the digital mischief. Perhaps it’s something about keeping those unpredictable digital coins from running off and hiding under the mattress of mainstream finance.

Crypto Firms and Banks: Now Entering the Banking Beast’s Den

According to the finest gossip in the financial realm, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) let slip that these pixelated mad scientists are nervously eyeing bank charters, licenses, and other official trinkets to slide themselves deeper into the old-school banking bastion. Circle, BitGo, and some others—like Coinbase and Paxos (who prefer to keep their cards close)—are apparently ready to reinvent the wheel, or at least to borrow a guaranteed wheel from the bank.

Some cryptic firms want to wear the robes of national trust or industrial bank charters, which means they get to act like traditional money-lenders: loaning, borrowing, and possibly offering dubious advice with your neighbor’s money. Others are busy chasing licenses to conjure stablecoins—those magical tokens that ideally don’t go poof when you blink—as Congress gradually stops poking the bear and starts trying to tame it instead.

The bargain? Get a bank charter, and you get to dance with the regulators, who are basically the party police with clipboards ready to pounce. Meanwhile, the ancient financial overlords, Deutsche Bank and Standard Chartered, are dusting off their old playbooks and trying to cozy up to the crypto kids because, well, nobody wants to be left out of the next financial circus.

According to WSJ insiders whispering through their smoky pipes, a few traditional banks are scheming ways to stretch their crypto limbs now that the new regime has swapped “regulate by fierce enforcement” for a gentler “blink twice and we’ll think about it” approach.

Yet, prudence still has a home. KeyCorp’s Big Boss, Chris Gorman, is watching the crypto fireworks with a wary eye—he’s eager but not ready to jump into the glittery abyss without checking for regulatory fireworks and anti-money laundering (AML) traps.

Waiting on Uncle Sam’s Green Light to Join the Crypto Parade

The old guard of banking, led by luminaries like Bank of America’s chief, Brian Moynihan, has announced they’re revving up crypto engines in the US. He promises the banks will “come hard” to crypto, which, depending on your level of optimism, might be either a passionate embrace or a shoving match.

In Moynihan’s vision, once lawmakers finish drawing all the confusing lines and issuing their countless regulations, banks will flood the space with stablecoins, those chameleons of the digital cash world. Let’s just hope they’re more stable than a caffeinated squirrel.

Remarkably, since January 20 (no, not a new magic spell, just a date), the Trump administration has taken a step back from the SEC’s formerly aggressive witch-hunting to a “maybe we should think about that” stance.

Meanwhile, Congress has been busy drafting all sorts of enchanted scrolls and acts, including the awkwardly named GENIUS Act—because who doesn’t want legislation that calls you a genius? It’s designed to bring stablecoins under the cozy umbrella of the Federal Reserve, hopefully without turning them into grumpy old bankers themselves.

The grand plan is to whip up a regulatory stew that is both “safe and pro-growth,” thereby making America the undisputed world capital of crypto—at least until the next disaster or exciting breakthrough rocks the boat again.

Crypto and banking chaos chart

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2025-04-22 06:45