EU Regulators Publish Batch of Draft Rules for Stablecoins Under MiCA

• The European Union's banking and markets regulators have issued a set of draft technical standards for stablecoins that reference multiple currencies or assets.
• The standards are one of several batches the watchdogs are expected to formulate and issue under the EU's landmark Markets in Crypto Asset (MiCA) regulation.

The European Union’s banking regulator published its last batch of draft requirements for stablecoins referencing multiple currencies under the bloc’s landmark Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) regulation on Wednesday.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) has been working with the EU's markets regulator ESMA, to establish rules under MiCA. Wednesday’s publication is one of several batches the regulators will issue. The EBA and ESMA are consulting on a number of other Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS).

The RTS published lays out the “requirements, templates and procedures complaints received by issuers” of what MiCA defines as asset reference tokens (ARTs). Unlike stablecoins that are pegged to the value of one currency like the euro or U.S. dollar, ARTs – such as Libra (later Diem), proposed by Meta a few years ago – can reference several of them or other assets like cryptocurrencies.

The MiCA regulation focused heavily on requirements for stablecoin issuers. While MiCA as a whole is set to take effect in December, rules for stablecoins will come into force this summer.

The regulators consulted on the draft standards between Jule and October last year.