Executive Summary

December 2025 marked a historic shift as digital assets formally entered the U.S. banking and financial system. Federal regulators, global banks, payment giants, and crypto-native platforms moved from experimentation to live on-chain infrastructure.

In this episode:

• 🏦 Regulatory Breakthroughs — The OCC grants national trust bank charters to Ripple, Circle, BitGo, Fidelity, and Paxos, signaling the end of regulatory hostility under the GENIUS Act.
• 🧱 On-Chain Finance — JPMorgan launches a tokenized money-market fund on Ethereum; SoFi issues the first stablecoin backed by a U.S. national bank.
• 💵 Stablecoins Go Mainstream — Visa enables USDC settlement on Solana, PYUSD gains federal oversight, and Intuit integrates stablecoins across major consumer finance apps.
• 🌐 Platform Convergence — Coinbase expands into stocks, prediction markets, AI advisory, and Solana trading, accelerating the rise of crypto financial super-apps.

Bottom line: crypto is no longer adjacent to finance — it is now part of the U.S. financial system’s core rails.