After a three-year journey, Figure Technologies, Inc. has withdrawn its application to become a federally chartered bank in the U.S. The decision comes after Wall Street lobbyists and state banking regulators raised concerns about the tech company’s banking plan, and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) was unable to approve the charter.
Figure has made the decision to withdraw our banking charter application as we focus the organization on other areas of growth with a broad set of established bank partners, the company said in a statement.
The bank had initially sought the charter as a means to streamline about 200 state licenses it was maintaining for financial activity across the U.S. However, traditional bankers were concerned that Figure might be the first of a new category of competitors who didn’t have to check as many of the burdensome compliance boxes as existing lenders.
The acting chief of the OCC, Michael Hsu, praised Figure’s willingness to rework its banking plan by agreeing to seek federal deposit insurance. However, the charter was formally withdrawn on July 31, according to OCC records.
Jesse Van Tol, president and CEO of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, welcomed the news that the company had given up on the charter. “Had Figure not withdrawn its application, both law and common sense would have dictated that regulators reject it,” said Van Tol. “This is good news for anyone who thinks we should have a stable, safe and appropriately supervised financial system.”
Anchorage Digital won its charter from the OCC in 2021, and two other companies that had sought to immediately follow suit – Paxos and Protego – didn’t manage to sway the crypto-skeptical regulator before their conditional approvals expired earlier this year.