In June 2025, Redemption Holding Co. finalized a historic Utah acquisition, taking control of Holladay Bank & Trust and becoming the first Black-led investment group to own a bank in a Western U.S. state.

While the newly formed financial institution stands out because of its ownership, it also holds the distinction of being the first African-American-led bank in American history that is not physically located within an economically vulnerable community. Redemption Bank also stands only in the Rockies and helps fill a geographic void in what has long been considered a Black-banking dessert that stretches from Houston to Southern California.

Ashley Bell is a lawyer who served as White House Policy Advisor during the first Trump administration and is currently the Redemption Bank executive chairman. After years in the White House, Bell decided to take his government policy experience west, partnering with civil rights leaders, business executives and sports figures to launch the digital-first bank.

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General view of the Wasatch Range mountains ahead of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament on March 19, 2024, in Salt Lake City, Utah. (Christian Petersen / Getty Images)

At launch, the bank held an estimated $65 million in assets and plans to prioritize commercial lending while building a dedicated small-business lending team.

“As Utah’s long-respected Holladay Bank and Trust transitions post-acquisition to Redemption Bank, our
bank founders are quickly building a fully tech-enabled, concierge platform focused on supporting
entrepreneurs’ ability to become even more economically resilient,” Bell said in a statement sent to FOX Business.

FIRST HISTORICALLY BLACK UNIVERSITY TELLS TRUMP ADMIN IT WANTS TO JOIN ACADEMIC COMPACT AFTER SCHOOLS DECLINE

Bell added: “We found an exceptional business environment in Utah, specifically in Holladay, along with a bank that has a clean balance sheet and a state with the highest average return on assets for banks in the country. We are committed to competing in Utah to earn the business of customers from all backgrounds.”

Bell also noted that the 2023 Holladay Bank acquisition was delayed by regulatory fallout from the Silicon Valley Bank collapse.

“This milestone reflects the power of partnership, vision and a shared belief that access to capital can transform lives,” Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said in a statement. “We’re grateful for the leaders who saw the potential and made it happen.”

Former New York Giants and Cincinnati Bengals linebacker Dhani Jones is also a Redemption Bank investor. Jones also played for the Philadelphia Eagles.

Former NFL linebacker Dhani Jones participates in an NBCUniversal Press Tour in Aug. 2017 during CNBC’s “Adventure Capitalists” session. (Chris Haston/NBCUniversal / Getty Images)

Collin Sexton, who is in his first season with the Charlotte Hornets, is also an investor — backed by TribeAngels and Coinlete. Sexton spent three years in Utah during his stint with the Utah Jazz.

The group of investors involved in the Holladay acquisition included Central Bancorporation and Ally Financial Inc.

Brandon Comer, managing partner at Alterity Capital and a Redemption Bank founding investor, believed so strongly in the need for this type of banking in Utah that he put his personal funds into it.

“We used to have over 140 Black-owned banks in the country, and (now) we are down to 20,” Comer told FOX Business. “Post-George Floyd, Ashley Bell and I came together and said, ‘Look, a lot of corporations see the impact that Black banks can have and Black banks see the opportunity of partnering with corporations, but there needs to be an intermediary that help can bridge the two and really help seize this moment.” 

Dr. Bernice A. King, the daughter of the late civil rights icon Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., was named Redemption Bank’s senior vice president for corporate strategy and serves on the company’s advisory board.

Dr. Bernice A. King arrives onstage during the 2026 Martin Luther King, Jr. Beloved Community Commemorative Service at Ebenezer Baptist Church on Jan. 19, 2026 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Paras Griffin / Getty Images)

“I know deeply what it means for a nation to respond in times of crisis and how communities come
together to realize that what’s needed, sometimes, has never been done,” King said in a statement. “Redemption will help deliver on my father’s dream of economic equality, and we are honored to be ushering in needed
change at such a pivotal time.”

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Redemption Bank becomes the nation’s 24th Black-owned bank, a group designated as Minority Depository Institutions. The most recent MDI launch came in 2023 with the creation of Adelphi Bank.

Federal Reserve Governor Stephen Miran resigned Tuesday from his role as chair of the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA), following through on a commitment to the Senate to fully dedicate himself to his position at the Federal Reserve.

President Donald Trump tapped Miran on Aug. 7 to fill the Federal Reserve seat vacated by Governor Adriana Kugler, who abruptly resigned to return to academia. Miran was slated to finish the remainder of Kugler’s term, which ended Jan. 31, 2026, but he may remain in the role until a successor is named. He has been on leave from his CEA post.

TRUMP NAMES MIRAN AS REPLACEMENT FOR FED BOARD SEAT

Stephen Miran, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, following a television interview outside the White House in Washington, D.C., US, on Tuesday, June 17, 2025. (Aaron Schwartz/Sipa/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)

“As you know, the Federal Reserve Act requires that members of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors be devoted full-time to that position. While I took an unpaid leave of absence from the Council to come to the Federal Reserve, I promised the Senate that if I should stay on the Board past January, I would formally depart the Council,” Miran wrote in his resignation letter to President Donald Trump.

“I believe it is important to stay true to my word while I continue to perform the job at the Federal Reserve to which you and the Senate appointed me,” he wrote, adding that it was with a “heavy yet proud heart that I tender my resignation from the Council and the White House.”

The White House confirmed the resignation in a statement to FOX Business.

“In accordance with the pledge he made to the Senate during his confirmation to the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors, Stephen Miran has submitted his resignation from the Council of Economic Advisers,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said in a statement to FOX Business.

Desai praised Miran’s tenure, saying that prior to the start of his leave last September, Miran’s “brilliant insights and powerful advocacy on behalf of the President made him an enormous asset for the White House,” adding that he became “a key member of the Trump administration’s economic team.”

Stephen Miran, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers and U.S. Federal Reserve governor nominee for President Donald Trump, is sworn in during a Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee confirmation hearing in Washington, D.C, on Th (Daniel Heuer/Bloomberg/Getty Images / Getty Images)

Miran’s resignation comes as Trump continues to reshape the Federal Reserve. On Friday, the president nominated Kevin Warsh to succeed Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell amid a criminal investigation.

TRUMP NOMINATES KEVIN WARSH TO SUCCEED JEROME POWELL AS FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIR

On Jan. 11, Powell confirmed that the Justice Department had opened a criminal probe into his congressional testimony related to the renovation of the central banks’ two historic main buildings on Washington, D.C.’s National Mall. 

Warsh’s ascension to the world’s most powerful central bank could be delayed by Republican opposition linked to a criminal probe of Powell. Sen. Thom Tillis R-N.C.has previously said he will oppose the confirmation of any Fed board nominee until the Trump administration concludes its investigation. Tillis’s resistance carries particular weight given his seat on the Senate Banking Committee. 

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Kevin Warsh, former governor of the US Federal Reserve, walks to lunch during the Allen & Co. Media and Technology Conference in Sun Valley, Idaho, US, on Wednesday, July 9, 2025. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)

With Tillis placing a hold on Warsh’s nomination, the only way to force it out of the Senate Banking Committee would be through a discharge vote on the Senate floor, a move that requires 60 votes and is unlikely in a deeply divided Senate, particularly amid tensions over the investigation into Powell.

On Monday, Trump told reporters in the White House that his administration will continue its criminal probe, adding that he suspected “gross incompetence” or “theft of some kind.”