Sony Bank has secured conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the US federal regulator that charters and supervises national banks, to establish a wholly owned US national trust bank subsidiary called Connectia Trust, with a $40M capitalization.
The subsidiary’s mandate is to issue and manage a dollar-backed stablecoin, with a commercial launch targeted for 2027, pending final OCC sign-off.
The approval is conditional, not final. Connectia Trust must satisfy all pre-opening requirements before the OCC grants the green light to actually commence business, meaning the stablecoin itself remains at least a year away from hitting the market.
Japan’s Sony Bank Wins US Stablecoin Approval
Sony Bank has secured conditional approval from the OCC to establish a U.S. national trust bank.
The lender plans to launch Connectia Trust with $40 million in capital this month. The unit aims to issue a dollar backed stablecoin,… pic.twitter.com/8CFJmx5yBh
— BSCN (@BSCNews) July 9, 2026
Stablecoin News: What Connectia Trust Is Built to Do
In a statement dated July 6, Sony Bank said it plans to establish Connectia Trust this month. The unit will issue and manage a dollar-denominated stablecoin, a digital token pegged 1:1 to the US dollar, designed to function as a payments rail inside Sony’s consumer ecosystem.
Sony Bank, part of Sony Financial Group, previously told Nikkei that it envisions US customers using the stablecoin to pay for video games, anime, subscriptions, and other digital content across Sony’s broader platform.
That framing positions this less as a financial product competing on liquidity metrics with USDC or USDT, and more as an in-ecosystem settlement layer tied to one of the world’s largest entertainment brands.
“The establishment of this trust subsidiary is intended to contribute to the development of a medium‑ to long‑term business foundation for the Sony Financial Group’s digital asset businesses,” Sony Bank said in its statement.
As a national trust bank, Connectia Trust will be able to hold customers’ assets but will not be permitted to accept cash deposits or make loans, the standard constraint for this class of OCC-chartered institution.
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Sony Joins a Crowded OCC Queue
Sony’s move fits a broader pattern in crypto regulation. The OCC conditionally approved Ripple, Circle, BitGo, Fidelity Digital Assets, and Paxos for national trust bank charters in 2025. Sony’s Connectia Trust application is one of roughly a dozen crypto-related charter requests currently before the agency.
The wave of approvals has drawn sharp pushback from US Senator Elizabeth Warren, who raised concerns that the OCC is “improperly granting” national trust charters to companies that do not qualify under the National Bank Act.
The Digital Chamber, representing more than 250 crypto-related entities, responded in May 2026, with CEO Cody Carbone calling Warren’s framing a misreading of both the statute and the OCC’s longstanding charter authority.
Sony is not the only major financial institution navigating regulated digital-asset infrastructure through existing banking frameworks. HSBC’s Orion tokenized deposit platform illustrates how traditional banks are pursuing similar regulatory pathways to bring digital currencies inside supervised structures.
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What Comes Next
Sony Bank has not yet named a representative for Connectia Trust. The OCC’s final approval, and the conditions attached to it, will determine the precise scope of what the subsidiary can offer when it eventually opens for business.
The outcome of parallel applications from firms like Coinbase and Paxos will also set a benchmark for how far the OCC is willing to extend its stablecoin-centric national trust bank framework.
For Sony, the 2027 timeline gives the stablecoin market and US crypto regulation more broadly time to mature before Connectia Trust begins operating at scale.
Whatever comes next, one thing is clear. Sony continues to dive deeper into the digital asset space, a trend that began all the way back in 2021 and continues today.
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