European Commission opens MiCA review consultation targeting multi-jurisdiction stablecoin issuance

What happened

The Commission launched a general public consultation and a more technical targeted consultation on the MiCA review in May 2026, with a response deadline of 30 August 2026. The trigger is the practice of issuing the same stablecoin from an EU entity and a non-EU entity in parallel, which supervisors argue could allow reserves ring-fenced for EU holders to be drained if holders in other jurisdictions redeem first during stress. The consultation also revisits three settled features of the current regime. It asks whether MiCA's blanket prohibition on paying interest or rewards on e-money tokens should be relaxed, prompted by the debate in the United States. It asks whether systemic issuers should be required to hold a share of reserves at the central bank and have access to lender-of-last-resort facilities, following the Bank of England's approach. And it asks whether banks should be required to issue stablecoins through separate subsidiaries, as the UK and US regimes require, rather than directly from the bank balance sheet as MiCA currently permits. A separate strand of the review considers centralising supervision of large crypto-asset service providers at ESMA rather than at national competent authorities.

Why it matters

MiCA was the first comprehensive crypto framework in a major jurisdiction, and reopening it three years after adoption is an acknowledgement that the rules were written before dollar stablecoins reached their current scale. The multi-issuance question is the most consequential: if the Commission requires full segregation or bans parallel issuance, the largest dollar tokens would have to choose between EU distribution and a single global reserve pool. The reserve and interest questions cut the other way. Allowing rewards and permitting more interest-bearing backing would improve euro stablecoin economics, which have lagged dollar products, while a central bank deposit requirement would tighten them.

What is not settled

The Commission has not published a legislative proposal or a date for one; whether multi-issuance is restricted, and whether the interest prohibition is lifted, remain open.