The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency published its long-awaited final report on bank “debanking” on 14 October 2026, after a two-year review of why America’s biggest banks keep closing or restricting accounts for legal businesses. Its preliminary findings, published in December 2025, explicitly named adult entertainment as one of the industries affected. The final report does not mention it once.
Why it matters to creators
If you’ve ever had a Chase, Bank of America or PayPal account frozen with no real explanation, this is more than a paperwork story. Federal regulators spent nearly a year documenting the exact pattern adult-industry workers have been describing for years — vague “reputation risk” policies, accounts closed without cause, no appeal that actually works — and then quietly dropped the industry from the finished product, even though nothing on the ground has changed. The OCC’s own data and the Free Speech Coalition’s member survey both say the closures are still happening.
What the report found — and what it dropped
The OCC reviewed the nine largest banks it supervises — JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo, US Bank, Capital One, PNC, TD Bank and BMO — covering September 2020 to September 2025. Examiners went through roughly 100,000 complaints and about 420,000 pages of bank documents. Comptroller Jonathan Gould called the result “irrefutable evidence that the nation’s largest banks have denied, debanked and discriminated” against lawful customers based on vague, subjective “reputation risk” standards rather than genuine financial crime or safety concerns.
The December 2025 preliminary report had listed adult film and entertainment companies alongside firearms dealers, oil and gas, coal, tobacco, private prisons, cryptocurrency and payday lenders as sectors facing restricted access. The final version keeps only six named sectors — Arctic oil and gas, coal, firearms, detention facilities, tobacco and digital assets — and says nothing about adult content at all, according to law firm Sidley’s analysis of the report. Neither the OCC nor the banks have explained why the industry disappeared between drafts, and the trade press has noticed: Adult FYI called it out directly, pointing out that the final report still describes the same unclear standards and poor communication that affect adult performers and companies, just without naming them.
The gap between the paperwork and your bank statement
The Free Speech Coalition, the adult industry’s main US trade association, says nearly two in three people working in the industry have had a bank or payment app account closed on them. The performer Alix Lynx told FSC that Chase shut her accounts with no specific reason given, and that other performers reported the same pattern. Cherie DeVille said Bank of America closed her account over her adult work; the bank told FSC the decision was based on account activity, not her profession. Both stories echo what OnlyFans’ own CEO, Keily Blair, told reporters about her own banking rejections — if the platform’s chief executive can’t get a straight answer from a bank, an individual creator has even less leverage.
This isn’t just a US problem either. UK creators have been dealing with a version of the same thing, and new FCA guidance earlier this year promised change there too, with mixed results so far. The pattern is consistent on both sides of the Atlantic: regulators acknowledge the problem publicly, then the specifics that would actually hold banks accountable get softened or dropped.
Is there anything in it for creators?
Yes, even without the name-check. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau opened its own investigation the same day the OCC report landed, checking whether the nine named banks complied with the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, the Fair Credit Reporting Act’s adverse-action notice rules, and the ban on unfair or deceptive practices. None of that requires your business to be named in the OCC’s sector list — if a bank closed your account without a clear written reason, that’s exactly the kind of complaint the CFPB says it wants to hear about. The OCC has also said it will keep reviewing account-termination practices and may issue further guidance on closure notices, so the paper trail from affected creators still matters, even if the final report’s wording doesn’t reflect it yet.
This is general information, not legal or financial advice — speak to a qualified professional about your specific situation.
What to do now
- File a complaint if you’ve been debanked. Use the OCC’s portal at HelpWithMyBank.gov and the CFPB’s complaint system. Reference the account closure date and any reason given, even if it was vague — “reputation risk” wording is precisely what both agencies are now scrutinising.
- Get closures in writing. If a bank restricts or closes your account, ask in writing for the specific reason. A refusal to give one, or a generic answer, is itself documented evidence for a future complaint or legal claim.
- Don’t rely on a single bank or processor. Keep a second account or payment relationship active where you can, so one closure doesn’t cut off your income overnight.
- Back the alternatives. The Free Speech Coalition is raising money to launch Opportunity Federal Credit Union, built specifically to serve adult-industry workers and businesses. Sharing your own debanking story with FSC also adds to the evidence base regulators and Congress are using.
- Watch for the CFPB’s next move. Its review of the nine named banks is ongoing; a finding against any of them could open the door to compensation claims for affected customers, including creators who were never named in the OCC’s report.
None of this fixes the underlying problem overnight, and a creator reading the final report in isolation would have no idea the industry was ever part of the conversation. But the pressure that produced the preliminary report hasn’t gone away, and creators who’ve built real income through this work are still the ones left explaining themselves to a bank teller. Keeping a paper trail now is the best insurance against the next unexplained closure.
