France pushes stricter MiCA stablecoin limits

TLDR

France is pushing the EU to tighten MiCA rules on non-euro stablecoins and to increase surveillance of self-custody crypto wallets.

1. The Bank of France wants stricter EU wide limits on using dollar stablecoins for payments under MiCA to reduce dependence on foreign currencies.
2. French lawmakers also backed an annual reporting rule for self hosted wallets over 5,000 euros, which would expand tax and compliance oversight beyond exchanges.
3. If these ideas gain traction, they could push European activity toward euro stablecoins, tokenized bank money and CBDCs, while raising operational friction for retail users and smaller firms.

Deep Dive

1. What France Is Actually Proposing

Denis Beau, First Deputy Governor of the Bank of France, urged the EU to impose tighter limits on non euro stablecoin payments under MiCA in a speech at the EUROFI seminar. He argued that current MiCA rules only partly address risks if large, non European issuers gain mainstream payment use and said the bank is "pressing for a strengthening" of MiCA to curb reliance on dollar backed coins, which make up about 98% of the stablecoin market today. This push is aimed at transactions and payment use, not just issuance, and is framed as a way to defend European monetary sovereignty and promote euro based digital money options.

2. New Pressure On Self Custody Users

Separately, France's National Assembly approved a provision in an anti fraud bill that would require residents to report self hosted wallet holdings above 5,000 euros to the tax administration once a year. The measure is not fully law yet and faces pushback over how it would be enforced and how sensitive wallet data would be protected. It shows regulators want visibility not only into exchange accounts but also into on chain balances held in private wallets that are normally outside custodial reporting flows.

3. How This Could Reshape The EU Stablecoin Landscape

France is pairing its MiCA stance with promotion of euro focused alternatives, including tokenized bank money and wholesale CBDC experiments like Pontes and Appia. Stronger caps on non euro stablecoins would likely:

1. Increase demand for euro stablecoins and bank issued tokens that fit within MiCA.
2. Make it harder for exchanges and DeFi apps in the EU to rely on dollar stablecoins as their main quote asset.
3. Accelerate divergence between EU style, tightly supervised stablecoin markets and more open regimes elsewhere.

For issuers and platforms, the key strategic question is whether to double down on MiCA compliant euro products or route European users to jurisdictions with looser interpretations.

Conclusion

France is using MiCA as a starting point and lobbying to turn it into a much tougher regime on dollar stablecoins and opaque holdings, not just a harmonized baseline. For crypto users and builders in Europe, the direction of travel points toward more euro denominated rails, more regulatory visibility into self custody and a shrinking space for unregulated use of global dollar stablecoins inside the EU.