ESMA Tells Crypto Firms to Stop Services for Stablecoins That Do Not Meet MiCA

ESMA’s opinion says that CASPs authorised under MiCA should stop all services connected with asset-referenced tokens (ARTs) and e-money tokens (EMTs) that do not comply with MiCA. This covers trading, exchange, order handling, advice, transfers, custody, administration and portfolio management. The opinion is addressed mainly to national supervisors, who decide how it applies to firms in their country. It goes further than ESMA’s public statement of 17 January 2025 on the same subject.

Supervisors should require firms to remove their remaining exposure no later than three months after publication, which is around 8 January 2027. For a limited time, narrow functions may continue under close supervision, namely selling the tokens, converting them, and transferring or withdrawing them for clients.

An exchange, custodian or payment service in the EU should list every stablecoin it supports and check whether the issuer holds the authorisation that MiCA requires for that token. A company that accepts crypto payments should ask its provider which stablecoins will still be accepted after the deadline, and we explain the payment side in our article on accepting cryptocurrency payments in business. Customers who hold such tokens with a provider should expect requests to sell or withdraw them. An opinion is not a regulation, but it shows what supervisors across the EU will expect.

• ESMA: Opinion on the provision of crypto asset services in relation to non-MiCA-compliant asset-referenced tokens and e-money tokens (8 October 2026)
• ESMA: Public Statement on the provision of certain crypto-asset services in relation to non-MiCA compliant ARTs and EMTs (17 January 2025)
• Regulation (EU) 2023/1114 on markets in crypto-assets (MiCA)