#支付系统与数字支付 Seeing the news about BitGo, a flashback immediately came to mind. I remember back in 2013, everyone was debating whether Bitcoin could be used for payments and whether the central banks and banking systems could accept it. The consensus at the time was: impossible. Blockchain and traditional finance were like two parallel lines that would never intersect.

And what happened? Over ten years have passed, and the path has completely reversed — it’s not that crypto assets are adapting to the traditional financial system, but that traditional finance is actively opening doors for crypto assets. BitGo received conditional approval from the OCC to transform into a national trust bank. The deeper significance of this isn’t just that BitGo is impressive, but that the attitude of US regulators towards digital asset custody has undergone a qualitative shift.

From a historical perspective, this is a signal — the integration of payment systems and digital assets is no longer a utopian dream but a reality at the institutional level. Think back to the Mt. Gox disaster, and then look at how today BitGo can provide nationwide custody and crypto services without needing approval from each state. How many failures and regulatory frictions have been experienced in between? Every failure has pushed practitioners to improve compliance frameworks, ultimately leading to this moment of recognition.

This logic has been repeatedly validated throughout history — every major upgrade of payment systems has been completed through cycles of chaos, failure, and regulation. From cash to checks, from checks to wire transfers, and now to digital payments. BitGo’s step, in a sense, is the completion of another small cycle.