Catena Labs Raises $30M Series A and Files for National Trust Bank Charter to Power AI Agent Finance

TLDR:

• Catena Labs raised $30M in a Series A round co-led by a16z crypto and Acrew Capital for AI finance.
• The company filed for a National Trust Bank charter with the OCC to regulate AI agent transactions.
• Catena’s platform lets operators set spending limits, audit trails, and controls for autonomous agents.
• Industry players like Coinbase and OKX are also racing to build agentic payments infrastructure globally.

Catena Labs, the agentic finance startup co-founded by Circle’s Sean Neville, has secured $30 million in a Series A round. A16z crypto and Acrew Capital co-led the raise.

The company simultaneously filed for a National Trust Bank charter with the OCC. This move positions Catena as a regulated fiduciary for AI agent transactions.

The funding follows an $18 million seed round, also led by a16z crypto, closed in 2025.

Building Financial Infrastructure for AI Agents

Catena Labs is developing a governance layer specifically designed for autonomous software transactions. The platform allows operators to set spending limits, define approved recipients, and cap account holdings before handing off financial execution to AI agents. These programmable controls are built directly into the account infrastructure rather than added on top.

Modern payment rails present serious obstacles for autonomous software. ACH transfers take days to settle, card networks carry high fees, and fraud detection systems flag non-human activity.

A16z crypto described the situation plainly, stating that Catena is building “a new category of regulated financial infrastructure purpose-built for autonomous software.” For agents expected to act instantly, existing conditions slow everything down considerably.

There is also no standard framework for proving agent identity or handling delegated authority. Businesses today must either grant agents direct access to corporate accounts or build workarounds that do not scale.

Catena addresses this gap with purpose-built infrastructure that supports wires, ACH, and onchain stablecoin payments.

A16z crypto’s Chris Dixon and Elizabeth Harkavy emphasized that agents need “bank accounts and payment rails they can access programmatically, along with clear rules and controls that keep humans in charge.” Catena’s model is designed to meet both technical and compliance requirements at the same time.

OCC Charter Filing and the Race for Agentic Payments

Catena has been accepted for filing a National Trust Bank charter with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. If fully approved, the charter would make Catena a regulated fiduciary for AI agents.

This gives businesses and individuals a compliant framework for running autonomous financial operations.

The agentic payments infrastructure space is moving quickly across the broader industry. Coinbase launched the first AI agent-purpose-built wallet in February 2026. OKX followed in April with an agent payments protocol covering offers, quotes, disputes, and settlements.

Deloitte has forecast that AI and stablecoins will reshape financial services by 2030. That projection reflects growing institutional recognition of autonomous software as a legitimate financial actor. Catena is positioning itself ahead of that shift with both regulatory and technical groundwork in place.

Catena’s leadership team includes veterans from Square, Brex, Affirm, Meta, Amazon, Airwallex, and PayPal. Sean Neville previously helped grow USDC into one of the most widely used digital dollars globally.

A16z noted that the team consists of people “who have built and run complex systems at global scale,” reinforcing confidence in the company’s ability to execute on its charter ambitions.

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