Latin American fintech company Nubank has won conditional approval to establish a U.S. national bank, Cointelegraph reported on Thursday. That would allow Nubank to provide financial services in the United States including deposits, loans, credit cards and digital-asset custody.

The approval puts Nubank into the bank organization phase. It must win additional approvals from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp (FDIC) and the Federal Reserve before it can begin formal operations. Nubank plans to start operations within 18 months. The Nubank U.S. bank will be led by co-founder Cristina Junqueira (크리스티나 준케이라), and former Brazilian central bank governor Roberto Campos Neto (로베르토 캄포스 네토) will serve as chairman of the board.

Nubank is a financial platform with more than 127 million customers in Brazil, Mexico and Colombia. Founded in 2013, it listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2021. As it expanded from fintech into digital assets, it partnered with Paxos in 2022 to introduce cryptocurrency trading and invested 1 percent of its net assets in bitcoin. In March this year, it added Cardano (ADA), Near Protocol (NEAR), Cosmos (ATOM) and Algorand (ALGO), expanding the number of supported tokens to 20.