Federal banking agencies adopt tech‑neutral capital rules for tokenized securities

U.S. federal banking regulators — the Federal Reserve, FDIC and OCC — issued joint guidance clarifying how existing capital, safety‑and‑soundness and risk‑management rules apply to tokenized securities and crypto custody. The agencies adopt a technology‑neutral stance: banks must treat tokenized versions of traditional assets the same as non‑tokenized equivalents for capital treatment and use the same prudential haircuts when tokenized assets are used as collateral. Regulators expect banks to manage operational, custody, liquidity and settlement risks under current frameworks, enforce custody controls and asset segregation, apply prudent valuation and reserve planning, and meet AML/CFT requirements. The guidance covers tokens on permissioned and permissionless chains and extends to derivatives referencing tokenized securities. It reduces regulatory uncertainty for banks providing custody, trading or collateral services but does not itself authorize new activities — banks still need the appropriate charters and supervisory approvals. For traders, the clarification lowers a key regulatory hurdle to wider institutional participation in tokenized securities markets, which could increase liquidity and institutional flows into tokenized stocks, bonds and other assets over time. Key SEO keywords: tokenized securities, banking regulation, crypto custody, capital rules.