IRS

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) granted World Liberty Financial a conditional national trust bank charter on August 14, 2026, a move that pushes the Trump-family-linked firm and its USD1 stablecoin straight into the middle of the US banking system. The charter, approved for a “World Liberty National Trust” entity, is built around USD1, a dollar-pegged stablecoin that has already grown past roughly $4 billion in circulation. Reuters, CNBC, the Wall Street Journal, The Block, Politico, and Fox Business all covered the decision within a day, and for good reason: a national trust charter is not a crypto exchange license. It is a banking charter, and it changes what a stablecoin issuer is allowed to be in the United States. ...

Three separate moves landed in the same news cycle this week, and together they tell one story: the US crypto regulatory map is being redrawn in real time, and no single agency is driving the pen. The SEC canceled a key crypto regulatory meeting, the CFTC signaled it will join the SEC in exploring crypto rules without waiting for the CLARITY Act, and a crypto coalition threw its weight behind Custodia Bank in a Supreme Court fight over Federal Reserve master-account access. For US investors, the combined message is that jurisdiction, banking access, and tax reporting are all on the table at once. ...

Fidelity is adding Ether ETF staking to its flagship Ethereum fund, unlocking a steady stream of yield for US shareholders. The Fidelity Ethereum Fund (ticker: FETH), which holds close to $900 million in assets, will begin staking a portion of its Ether and passing the rewards to investors as quarterly distributions. It is one of the first major yield-bearing crypto ETFs in the US market, and it turns a passive Ethereum position into an income-producing asset inside a standard brokerage account. ...

The SEC has just dropped the agenda for its most anticipated meeting of the year: August 14, 2026 — a closed-door session where Commissioners will vote on a proposed framework tentatively titled “Regulation Crypto.” If adopted, it would create a bespoke token offering registration pathway, distinct from the existing securities registration regime that has been a square-peg-in-round-hole nightmare for crypto projects since 2017. For US crypto investors, the stakes could not be higher. This single meeting could determine which tokens remain listed on US exchanges, how your staking rewards are taxed, and whether the next wave of crypto innovation happens in New York or Singapore. ...

Ethereum staking is no longer a niche DeFi experiment — it’s a multi-billion-dollar institutional industry. In August 2026, the landscape shifted again: Grayscale announced it would stake 161,000 idle ETH from its Ethereum Mini Trust ETF, unlocking quarterly cash yields for US shareholders. Simultaneously, a new Ethereum Improvement Proposal threatens to cut staking rewards by 13%, the SEC continues to tighten its grip on staking-as-a-service, and the IRS keeps treating every staking reward as a taxable event the moment it hits your wallet. ...

You made money in crypto this year. Maybe a lot. And now you’re staring at a 1099 from Coinbase or Kraken wondering: How much of this do I actually owe the IRS? The short answer: in 2026, the IRS treats cryptocurrency as property — same as stocks or real estate. Every single taxable event (selling, trading, spending, earning) must be reported. But there’s good news: with the right strategy, you can legally slash your bill by thousands of dollars. ...