The New Fintech Executive Order Is a Signal to Regulators

President Trump’s May 19, 2026 Executive Order on fintech innovation directs federal financial regulators to reexamine whether their existing rules, guidance, supervisory practices, and application processes are unnecessarily slowing the integration of fintech firms, digital assets, and innovative financial technology into the regulated financial system.

The Executive Order states a clear policy preference. The federal government should “streamline regulatory processes,” reduce unnecessary barriers to entry, and encourage collaboration between fintech firms, federally regulated financial institutions, and federal financial regulators. The White House framed the order as an effort to promote financial innovation and competition by removing barriers faced by fintech firms seeking to partner with banks, credit unions, broker-dealers, investment advisers, futures commission merchants, and other regulated financial institutions.

For years, fintech companies have often been told that innovation is welcome, provided they can fit themselves into regulatory structures built for older market participants. This order asks whether the regulatory structures themselves need to be modernized so that lawful innovation can be integrated into traditional financial services with greater speed, clarity, and consistency.

A Broad Definition of Fintech

The Executive Order defines “fintech firm” expansively. It includes non-bank companies that use or develop technology to offer or support financial products or services, including payment processing, lending, deposit-taking, derivatives, investment management, brokerage services, underwriting and capital-markets activities, custody, fiduciary services, digital banking, digital asset-related services, securities and commodities market activities, and blockchain-based services.

The order is not limited to consumer apps, payment companies, or crypto-native businesses. It reaches firms operating across the financial markets infrastructure stack, including companies touching securities, commodities, investment management, custody, banking, and blockchain-based services. The practical effect is that a broad range of fintech businesses may soon see regulators revisiting approval pathways, partnership models, supervisory expectations, and interpretive positions that previously constrained market entry.

The 90-Day Review

The core operative provision is a 90-day review requirement. Within 90 days, the head of each federal financial regulator must review existing regulations, guidance, supervisory practices, and application processes to identify items that could be updated to facilitate innovation and competition, particularly for small and emerging fintech firms.

That review must focus on barriers that impede fintech firms from entering into partnerships with federally regulated institutions. The order specifically identifies partnerships with insured depository institutions, credit unions, broker-dealers, investment advisers, and futures commission merchants. It also directs regulators to examine items that could be amended to streamline application processes for eligible fintech firms seeking bank charters, credit union charters, deposit or share insurance, and other federal licenses, registrations, and authorizations.

The order also includes limiting principles. Regulators are directed to balance innovation interests against safety and soundness, consumer and investor protection, market integrity, financial stability, and oversight. That language is important because it gives regulators room to modernize without abandoning their statutory mandates. It also makes clear that the order is likely to produce process reforms, guidance changes, and supervisory recalibration before it produces any sweeping substantive deregulation.

Federal Reserve Access Provision

The most consequential section may be the request directed to the Federal Reserve Board. The order asks the Board to evaluate the legal, regulatory, and policy framework governing access to Reserve Bank payment accounts and payment services by uninsured depository institutions and non-bank financial companies, including firms engaged in digital assets and other novel financial activities.

This is a major issue for payment firms, stablecoin-related businesses, digital asset infrastructure providers, and fintech companies seeking more direct access to payment rails. The order asks the Federal Reserve to assess whether it has authority under the Federal Reserve Act and other federal law to extend direct access to covered firms, what options exist for expanding that access, what legal impediments remain, and whether the twelve Federal Reserve Banks have independent authority to grant or deny access.

The order also asks the Federal Reserve, where existing law permits access, to establish transparent application procedures and make determinations on complete applications within 90 days. For fintech firms that have struggled with opaque, lengthy, or inconsistent access determinations, that provision could prove meaningful.

Digital Financial Technology Policy Shift

This order builds on the administration’s earlier digital financial technology policy agenda. In January 2025, President Trump issued Executive Order 14178, “Strengthening American Leadership in Digital Financial Technology,” which emphasized U.S. leadership in digital assets and financial technology while protecting economic liberty.

The May 2026 order moves from broad policy posture to regulatory implementation. It asks agencies to identify specific rules, guidance, no-action positions, orders, supervisory practices, and application processes that may be limiting lawful fintech activity. It therefore creates a more concrete agenda for the SEC, CFTC, OCC, FDIC, CFPB, NCUA, and Federal Reserve.

What Market Participants Should Watch

Fintech firms and regulated financial institutions should monitor several developments over the next six months.

First, agency reviews may lead to revised guidance on bank-fintech partnerships, third-party risk management, custody, digital asset services, payments, brokerage integrations, investment advisory platforms, and embedded finance. The OCC has already identified bank-fintech arrangements, artificial intelligence, digital assets, and tokenization as key areas within its fintech supervisory focus.

Second, fintech firms seeking charters, licenses, registrations, or regulatory approvals should watch for streamlined application procedures. The order specifically directs agencies to examine processes for bank charters, credit union charters, deposit or share insurance, and other federal authorizations. That could create new opportunities, but applicants should expect regulators to continue demanding serious governance, compliance, risk management, cybersecurity, financial resources, and consumer or investor protection frameworks.

Third, digital asset firms should pay particular attention to the Federal Reserve access review. Direct or more transparent access to payment accounts and services would be highly consequential for stablecoin issuers, payment infrastructure firms, crypto custodians, and other businesses seeking to connect digital asset activity with traditional payment systems.

Fourth, regulated institutions should consider whether the order changes their strategic approach to fintech partnerships. If agencies respond by clarifying expectations and reducing unnecessary friction, banks, broker-dealers, investment advisers, and futures commission merchants may have more room to collaborate with fintech providers. That room will come with continuing diligence obligations.

The Compliance Point

The order should not be read as a license to move fast and ignore the rules. It is an instruction to regulators to reconsider whether the rules, guidance, and processes are calibrated properly for modern financial technology. Firms that treat the order as a deregulatory blank check will misread it.

The better reading is that the administration wants regulated innovation. Fintech firms that can demonstrate sound governance, credible compliance programs, strong controls, careful treatment of customer assets and data, and a clear understanding of applicable banking, securities, commodities, and consumer protection obligations will be better positioned to benefit from any resulting reforms.

Conclusion

The Executive Order is a meaningful development because it puts regulatory process at the center of fintech policy. It recognizes that innovation can be slowed as much by unclear procedures, inconsistent supervisory expectations, and fragmented agency approaches as by formal prohibitions.

For fintech firms, digital asset companies, banks, broker-dealers, investment advisers, and other market participants, the next 90 to 180 days will matter. The order creates a window for regulators to clarify pathways, modernize outdated approaches, and invite lawful innovation into the regulated financial system. The firms best positioned to take advantage of that shift will be those that pair technological ambition with regulatory discipline.