Summary

• France's Treasury, AMF, Banque de France and ACPR have jointly proposed revisions to the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation.
• The proposals would clarify the boundary between cryptoasset, securities and payment legislation while increasing ESMA supervision of significant providers and crypto groups.
• The authorities also seek safeguards for euro stablecoins, multi-jurisdiction issuance, decentralised finance, staking and cryptoasset lending. These remain consultation proposals, not enacted rules.

France’s financial authorities have called for tighter and more consistent European supervision of cryptoasset businesses, proposing changes that would clarify how digital assets fit alongside established banking, payment and securities regulation.

The joint recommendations, published on 21 October, respond to the European Commission’s consultation on revising the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA). They address several areas where digital asset services have developed beyond the activities covered clearly by the original legislation.

The French Treasury, Banque de France, Autorité de Contrôle Prudentiel et de Résolution (ACPR) and Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF) want stronger investor safeguards, more coordinated supervision and clearer treatment of services that combine conventional finance with blockchain-based arrangements.

Although the authorities support closer coordination between regulatory frameworks, they do not advocate merging them into one set of rules. Their position is that financial instruments and payment products should remain subject to the legislation governing their economic function, regardless of the technology used to issue or transfer them.

Traditional finance and crypto rules retain separate roles

MiCA introduced a harmonised EU framework for certain cryptoassets and related service providers, including requirements concerning authorisation, conduct, governance and market integrity.

The legislation does not apply identically to every digital representation of value. Financial instruments such as shares and bonds generally remain within established securities law, even where their ownership is recorded through distributed ledger technology.

Deposits, payment instruments and other regulated financial products can also fall under separate legislation. That creates practical difficulties when a business provides services involving more than one category of activity.

A company developing tokenised financial products may need to consider securities requirements, payment rules, custody arrangements and cryptoasset authorisation. Some functions can overlap, while the legal treatment of a product may change according to the rights it represents.

The French authorities want clearer boundaries between those regimes and simpler procedures where a single activity requires several permissions. Their proposals aim to reduce unnecessary duplication without allowing businesses to select a less demanding regulatory category merely by changing the technology used.

For example, representing a security as a token does not remove the legal rights associated with the underlying instrument. Investors may still depend on disclosure, market conduct and settlement protections established under securities legislation.

The authorities also recommend adapting prudential requirements to the actual risks of particular services, rather than assuming that every cryptoasset business requires identical capital and operational safeguards.

Such differentiation could influence how exchanges, custody providers and businesses offering tokenised financial products structure their European operations. The final effect would depend on definitions and thresholds agreed through the legislative process.

Euro stablecoins enter the monetary sovereignty debate

The submission supports wider adoption of euro-denominated stablecoins, classified under MiCA as electronic money tokens, alongside commercial bank deposits represented through digital tokens.

Although both arrangements may facilitate digital transfers, they create different legal claims. A tokenised bank deposit represents a relationship with a commercial bank, whereas an electronic money token is issued under a different regulatory structure.

The distinction affects who owes money to the holder, which safeguards apply and how the product may be redeemed.

French authorities see potential uses in cross-border payments and financial markets where tokenised assets are issued, transferred or settled. They argue that well-regulated euro instruments could support European monetary autonomy while expanding the role of the currency in international transactions.

They also want EU-authorised cryptoasset service providers to be explicitly prohibited from offering services involving stablecoins that fail to comply with MiCA.

That measure is a proposed clarification and should not be presented as a new prohibition already enacted on 21 October.

Additional proposals address multi-issuance arrangements, where economically interchangeable stablecoins are issued in both the European Union and third countries.

These structures can allow tokens to circulate across several jurisdictions, potentially improving access to international liquidity. However, differences in the supervision of issuers, reserve assets and redemption arrangements can create uncertainty about the protection available to holders.

The authorities propose equivalence assessments, cooperation between supervisors and additional guarantees concerning reserves and redemption rights.

Those arrangements would be intended to preserve access to global markets while reducing opportunities for weaker regulatory protections elsewhere to undermine the safeguards expected in Europe.

They would also introduce operational requirements for issuers and providers seeking to maintain cross-border fungibility between tokens issued under different legal frameworks.

ESMA could receive stronger supervisory powers

Under the existing MiCA framework, national competent authorities perform important authorisation and supervisory functions for cryptoasset service providers.

Businesses operating across several European markets can therefore maintain regulatory relationships centred in one member state while serving customers elsewhere through the framework’s cross-border provisions.

The French submission argues for a stronger role for the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) in supervising significant providers and groups combining several cryptoasset activities.

Large businesses may operate exchanges, custody services and other commercial functions within related companies, making it difficult to understand their combined risk through the supervision of individual entities alone.

A more coordinated European approach could help regulators assess group-wide dependencies and identify activities that create risks beyond the jurisdiction where one part of the business is authorised.

The authorities also support cooperation against unauthorised providers. Firms offering services without the necessary permissions can undermine licensed competitors and expose users to arrangements that lack the safeguards required under EU law.

More centralised supervision would nevertheless require decisions about responsibilities, resources and the relationship between ESMA and national authorities.

The French position does not itself transfer supervisory authority or establish a new European licensing body.

Decentralised finance needs identifiable responsibilities

The submission also calls for a proportionate regulatory framework covering decentralised finance, where software protocols can facilitate financial activity without following the organisational structure of a conventional bank or exchange.

Such services may involve developers, governance participants, interface operators and other intermediaries performing different functions.

Determining responsibility can therefore be difficult when no single organisation controls every element of a transaction.

The French authorities favour clearer allocation of responsibilities for identifiable intermediaries, appropriate due diligence requirements and the possibility of protocol certification.

Their objective is to introduce safeguards for users without treating every technical arrangement as identical to a conventional financial institution.

The submission also seeks clearer rules for staking and the lending or borrowing of cryptoassets.

Staking generally involves committing eligible cryptoassets to activities associated with a blockchain network in return for potential rewards. Lending arrangements involve different contractual and operational risks, including the possibility that assets may not be returned as expected.

The relevant protections depend on the provider’s role, the rights held by customers and whether intermediaries exercise control over assets.

Clarifying these activities could make it easier for providers to determine their obligations, while allowing regulators to identify where users face risks that existing legislation does not address adequately.

Consultation proposals remain distinct from law

The French authorities’ recommendations connect competitiveness with investor protection, arguing that clearer legal arrangements can support innovation without weakening the safeguards applied to financial activity.

They also reflect the growing interaction between conventional institutions and businesses developing digital asset infrastructure.

European banks, payment companies and technology providers may use tokenisation for different purposes, from internal record keeping to transferring assets between institutions. Those applications should not automatically receive the same regulatory classification simply because they use distributed ledger technology.

The Commission will need to assess the French submission alongside other consultation responses before determining whether and how to propose legislative revisions.

Any changes would then require the applicable EU legislative process. The authorities have not announced a completed MiCA amendment, an immediate transfer of supervision to ESMA or a new licensing requirement taking effect on publication.

The proposals establish a detailed French negotiating position: preserve the legal distinction between different financial activities, improve coordination where services overlap and strengthen protections for significant cross-border crypto businesses.

The commercial consequences will depend on which recommendations enter a future legislative proposal and whether the resulting framework provides greater certainty without imposing overlapping obligations that are difficult for providers to implement.