The charter would allow the firm to "expand upon our industry-leading Custody business," opening up opportunities to launch new products, including payments and related services. However, stresses the firm in a blog: "Coinbase has no intention of becoming a bank." The firm, which continues to operate under NYDFS oversight, says: "An OCC charter will streamline oversight for new offerings and enable continued innovation to integrate digital assets into traditional finance." Coinbase is one of several crypto firms - including Circle, Paxos and Ripple - to apply for a charter in recent months, taking advantage of more favourable US environment for the sector.