Stripe Subsidiary Seeks OCC Charter; Gold Hits All-Time High; Nova Credit Series D
Cole Gottlieb, AVP Corporate Strategy
U.S.-China trade war rekindles, causing market turbulence. Stripe’s stablecoin subsidiary seeks OCC trust charter. Nova Credit, Basis Theory, Telcoin announce new funding rounds.
Prosper, CRB Securities and Cross River Bank announced the successful closing of Prosper’s inaugural 100% prefunded asset-backed securities transaction, Prosper Asset Receivables Trust, 2025-1.
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Markets See-Saw on Renewed Tariff Threats
Markets see-sawed last week, as President Trump made new threats to increase tariffs on Chinese-made goods by 100% in response to moves from Beijing to limit exports of rare earth minerals. China controls about 60% of the global mining of rare earth minerals and more than 90% of the refining of the minerals. U.S. stock markets plunged on the news, erasing about $2Tr in market cap, before rebounding.
The reignited trade war uncertainties also rocked crypto markets, with the price of popular assets like bitcoin and ether sliding. The sharp drop in cryptoasset prices led to traders with leveraged positions being liquidated, further exacerbating the situation with more than $19Bn in crypto positions liquidated. So-called stablecoins weren’t immune to the chaos, with the third largest by issuance, USDe, seeing its price drop as low as $0.65 on the Binance exchange, amid what some are describing as “technical” issues rather than a “depeg.”
There is one asset that seems to be weathering the latest storm just fine: gold. Prices for the shiny metal hit an all-time high, with an ounce trading at a spot price of $4,200 for the first time last week.
Stripe Subsidiary Seeks OCC Charter
Stripe’s recently acquired stablecoin infrastructure subsidiary, Bridge, has officially submitted an application to the OCC to form a national trust bank. Bridge is the latest firm in the stablecoin space to do so, following applications from Ripple, Coinbase, Paxos, and Fidelity. Trust banks are not permitted to hold insured deposits or make loans but are permitted to engage in fiduciary activities and to custody assets. Stablecoin firms pursuing OCC trust bank charters have said that obtaining the charter will align with the requirements to become a permitted payment stablecoin issuer under the recently passed GENIUS Act. Zach Abrams, cofounder of Bridge, commented on the charter application in a post on X, writing, “We’ve long believed stablecoins will be a core, regulated financial building block. This regulatory infrastructure will enable us to tokenize trillions of dollars and make this future possible.”
In other Stripe stablecoin news, the payment processing platform announced it will now support use of stablecoins for subscription payments. The capability will allow customers to use their crypto wallets to make payments for subscriptions, which will immediately settle into crypto.
Nova Credit Bags $35MM Series D
Cashflow underwriting analytics firm Nova Credit announced it has raised a $35MM Series D. The company, which initially focused on infrastructure to help lenders underwrite immigrants and expats based on their home country credit history, is now primarily focused on its Nova Credit Platform. The platform enables lenders to develop workflows that incorporate traditional credit bureau data as well as “alternative” sources of data, like bank account transaction records and payroll information. Nova Credit has seen success with major players adopting its Cash Atlas offering, which offers lenders cashflow-based credit score as well as more granular model features. The company plans to use the new funding to continue developing and scaling its offerings. Nova Credit cofounder and CEO Misha Esipov commented on the fundraise, saying, “The funding arrives as cash flow underwriting reaches an inflection point, with lenders, property managers and financial service providers increasingly recognizing that traditional credit bureau data alone provides an incomplete and therefore inaccurate picture of a consumer’s financial health.”
Basis Theory Announces $33MM in New Funding
Payments infrastructure company Basis Theory announced it has raised a $33MM Series B. The funding round was led by Costanoa, with participation from Moneta VC, Bessemer Venture Partners, Stage 2 Capital, Box Group, Kindred Ventures, and others. Basis Theory offers a “payment vault,” which enables merchants to more easily manage payment data and operations across multiple, global payment providers. Basis Theory allows merchants to tokenize sensitive payment data while maintaining control over how payment credentials are accessed and shared with third-party partners. More recently, Basis Theory has begun developing “agentic commerce” capabilities, allowing clients to manage agentic payment workflows. Basis Theory cofounder and CEO Colin Luce commented on the fundraise, saying, “The payments ecosystem is changing rapidly, and merchants no longer want to be locked into rigid platforms. We're giving control back by making payments data as accessible and programmable as any other data type so it can fuel growth, intelligence, and automation across the entire business.”
Telcoin Raises $25MM to Capitalize Nebraska-Chartered Digital Asset Bank
Telcoin, a Nebraska-chartered Digital Asset Depository Institution, announced it has raised $25MM in its effort to become the “first regulated blockchain bank in the United States.” The new funding is part of an ongoing Series A. The capital raise allows Telcoin to meet the state charter’s capital requirements for its conditionally approved state charter. The specialty Nebraska charter allows holders to custody digital assets, issue stablecoins, participate in non-lending digital asset banking business, facilitate defi protocols, and provide payment services. The company says that operationalizing its state charter will pave the way for it to make its eUSD stablecoin the first “bank-issued” stablecoin. Company founder and CEO Paul Neuner commented, “Telcoin is betting that consumers really just want usable digital dollars, not a bunch of different branded USD stablecoins… With our first-of-its-kind bank and stablecoin, we're providing real access to bridge the gaps between traditional banking and decentralized finance.”
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