ESMA MiCA Review Response: What CASPs and Token Issuers Should Map

ESMA’s response to the European Commission’s targeted consultation on the review of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114 on markets in crypto-assets (MiCA), reference ESMA75-113276571-1721, is dated 30 September 2026, the day the consultation closed. The ESMA MiCA review response is written as a thematic policy paper, and its asks reach the processes a crypto-asset service provider (CASP) or token issuer runs: how a token is classified, which services need a licence, where a white paper is notified, how the capital floor is calculated, and what a client is told about costs, staking and lending.

None of it is law yet. Article 140(1) MiCA requires the Commission, having consulted the EBA and ESMA, to present a report on the application of the Regulation, accompanied “where appropriate” by a legislative proposal, and ESMA’s paper is input to that report. What it gives compliance and regulatory reporting teams is a map of where ESMA, drawing on what it calls its “initial implementation experience”, thinks the current text falls short.

Related reading: MiCA Review: The EBA’s Priorities for Token Issuers and CASPs

Where the ESMA MiCA review response sits in the review timeline

The response closes a sequence that began with the Commission’s December 2025 package. The dates that matter for planning:

• 4 December 2025: the Commission’s market integration and supervision package is published, and ESMA welcomes it the same day. ESMA’s response calls it the Market Integration and Supervisory Package (MISP) and refers to “the MISP proposal to transfer CASP supervision to ESMA”.
• 20 May 2026: the Commission launches a public consultation for individuals and a targeted consultation on MiCA.
• 1 July 2026: the outer limit of the Article 143(3) transitional period for CASPs that provided services under national law before 30 December 2024. Member States could shorten it, and several did.
• 24 September 2026: the date of the EBA’s own response to the targeted consultation.
• 30 September 2026, 23:59 CEST: the targeted consultation closes, according to the Commission’s consultation page (the 20 May launch announcement had given 31 August). ESMA’s response carries the same date.
• 30 June 2027: the Commission’s Article 140 report is due.

The Commission’s consultation page says the answers will feed the reports it must prepare under Articles 140 and 142. Several ESMA asks land on questions the Commission is already obliged to answer. Article 140(2) requires the report to assess whether an approval mechanism is needed for white papers of crypto-assets other than ARTs and EMTs (point (c)), whether CASP prudential requirements should be aligned with the Investment Firms Regulation and Directive (point (r)), the development of decentralised finance (point (t)) and fraudulent marketing communications on social media (point (n)). ESMA’s white paper, capital, DeFi and marketing proposals therefore bear on items in the Commission’s statutory checklist; ESMA does not propose an approval mechanism, so the point (c) assessment stays with the Commission.

The MISP sits on a parallel track. ESMA says CASP supervision falls outside the scope of the MiCA consultation, yet asks for “full alignment” between the two files, including for CASPs that belong to groups under consolidated supervision. The paper treats adoption of the package as open, referring to ESMA becoming the CASP supervisor “if/when” that happens. For the background on how the Commission structured its questions, see our summary of the EC MiCAR review consultation for CASPs, and for firms still unwinding services after the transitional period, our note on MiCA CASP wind-down obligations after 1 July 2026.

Proposal map: ESMA’s asks against the current MiCA text

The table sets each proposal beside the rule that applies today. The middle column is operative; the right column has no legal effect until the Commission proposes, and the co-legislators adopt, an amendment.

Token classification: from occasional opinions to binding ones

ESMA calls classification “one of the most important issues under MiCA” and locates the disputes at three boundaries: crypto-assets in MiCA against financial instruments under MiFID II; ARTs against EMTs; and crypto-assets in MiCA against assets outside it altogether, such as certain NFTs, non-transferable tokens or “technical tokens” like wrappers. Hybrid tokens, fractionalised NFTs, wrapped or tokenised arrangements and governance tokens are its examples of where legal form and economic substance drift apart. Divergent national outcomes, in ESMA’s words, “may encourage forum shopping”.

The tool MiCA provides today is Article 97(3). A competent authority of the home or host Member State may ask ESMA, EIOPA or the EBA for an opinion on classification, which must be delivered within 15 working days. ESMA reports that it has issued only one such opinion on an NCA’s request, describes these opinions as non-binding, and notes that the ESAs cannot act unless an NCA asks. Its proposal has two parts: legal certainty on classification written into the Level 1 text, and a mechanism for ESMA, in consultation with the EBA or jointly, to issue binding opinions on token classification, including on its own initiative where recurring patterns appear across the EU.

The proposal leaves the method intact. ESMA says the existing ESMA and joint ESAs classification guidelines, for which it cites its own financial-instrument qualification guidelines (ESMA75453128700-1323), “have proven to be a good basis”, and the binding opinions would still rest on a case-by-case, substance-based assessment of all the token’s attributes. For a Title II offeror, the practical anchor stays Article 8(4): the white paper notification must be accompanied by an explanation of why the crypto-asset is not excluded under Article 2(4), not an e-money token and not an asset-referenced token. A binding-opinion mechanism would add an input with more weight than today’s Article 97(3) opinions to that explanation. Our guide to ESMA’s crypto-asset financial instrument classification guidelines covers the current test.

One classification point reaches derivatives desks. MiFID II generally sorts derivatives by physical or cash settlement, and ESMA observes that the legislation “does not expressly address derivatives settled in stablecoins”. Its view is that settlement in ARTs or EMTs should not stop a derivative from qualifying as a financial instrument under MiFID II, and it invites the Commission to consider clarifying the treatment of derivatives settled in ARTs, EMTs or other crypto-assets, acknowledging that settlement risk differs by settlement asset.

Unauthorised stablecoins: from a 2025 statement to a statutory test

Offering an ART or EMT to the public, or seeking its admission to trading, already requires authorisation. The open question has been how far that prohibition reaches into CASP services. The Commission’s Q&A 2404 addressed which services may amount to an offer to the public or admission to trading under Articles 16(1) and 48(1), and ESMA’s public statement of 17 January 2025 (ESMA75-223375936-6099) translated it into expectations. CASPs operating trading platforms were expected to stop making non-MiCA-compliant ARTs and EMTs available for trading; reception and transmission of orders, execution, and exchange were expected to cease where they constituted an offer to the public; restrictions on existing services were to be completed by the end of January 2025, with a “sell only” window until the end of Q1 2025. The same statement said “mere custody and transfer of these crypto-assets should remain possible”.

That statement also conceded its own limit: “Neither ESMA nor NCAs possess any formal power to disapply a directly applicable EU legal text.” The 2026 response picks up where it left off. ESMA reports uncertainty over the extent to which authorised CASPs may continue to facilitate “the availability, use or trading of unauthorised stablecoins”, and asks the Commission to amend MiCA so that a CASP cannot provide “any licensable service under MiCA” in relation to ARTs or EMTs that do not comply with MiCA. ESMA wants a “binary supervisory test” and no divergence between MiCA’s definition of an offer to the public and the definition used in other EU regulations.

My reading is that “any licensable service”, taken literally, covers custody and transfer, both of which are crypto-asset services under MiCA and both of which the January 2025 statement left open. ESMA’s paper does not address how existing client holdings would be handled under such a rule. A CASP that still holds non-compliant ARTs or EMTs in custody for EU clients would, if the amendment were adopted in ESMA’s terms, be running a service the statement tolerated and the amended text would not. For authorised EMT issuers, the argument runs the other way: ESMA frames the current gap as creating “disparities between compliant and non-compliant issuers”.

DeFi: a narrower exemption and a gateway service for CASPs

MiCA’s DeFi boundary lives in a recital. Recital 22 says the Regulation applies to services performed, provided or controlled by a person “including when part of such activities or services is performed in a decentralised manner”, and that services “provided in a fully decentralised manner without any intermediary” fall outside it. ESMA reports divergent views across the EU on what “full decentralisation” means and names the risk it creates: “decentralisation washing”, where an identifiable operator uses DeFi-type language to avoid MiCA obligations. It asks the Commission to define DeFi in the legal text and keep the exemption “as narrow as possible”. As a fallback, the Commission could empower ESMA to issue technical guidelines, which ESMA argues would let the framework follow technology without repeated legislative changes.

The second DeFi proposal adds a new regulated crypto-asset service. ESMA has seen authorised CASPs give clients access to DEXs, lending and borrowing protocols, staking and re-staking mechanisms, liquidity provision protocols and yield strategies, or provide a user interface to unregulated smart contracts. It flags conflicts of interest where a CASP routes client activity to particular protocols. The proposed “gatekeeper” service could cover situations where a CASP provides a technical interface enabling clients to interact with DeFi protocols, facilitates transaction routing or interaction with smart contracts, or otherwise acts as an intermediary between clients and decentralised financial services. The obligations ESMA lists are disclosure of DeFi protocol risks, transparency on protocol selection and routing, conflicts management, due diligence on protocols offered through the interface, and operational and cybersecurity safeguards, all proportionate to the CASP’s control over the underlying protocol.

The boundary runs through ESMA’s own non-examples. Open-source development, self-custody, automated smart contracts and permissionless infrastructure “should not automatically amount to regulated intermediation”. By contrast, on ESMA’s description, a CASP that routes a client’s swap to a DEX through its own interface fits the situations the gatekeeper service could cover. The AML side of the same question uses control as its test too, as our note on the FATF DeFi report and VASP control sets out. Article 142(2)(a) had already asked the Commission to assess the necessity and feasibility of regulating DeFi, so ESMA’s proposal arrives at a question the legislator flagged in 2023.

Title II white papers: one notification point at ESMA

Title II covers crypto-assets other than ARTs and EMTs. Under Article 8, the offeror, the person seeking admission to trading or the trading platform operator notifies the white paper to the competent authority of its home Member State. Article 8(3) bars competent authorities from requiring prior approval. The notification, with the Article 8(4) classification explanation, must reach the home authority at least 20 working days before publication (Article 8(5)), and that authority must pass the information to ESMA within five working days of receipt (Article 8(7)) so that ESMA can make the white paper available in its register under Article 109(2) by the start of the offer or admission. Since 23 December 2025 the white paper itself must also meet the machine-readable format requirements, including iXBRL, set by Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2024/2984.

ESMA’s complaint concerns the five-working-day leg. That deadline, it says, makes a review of each white paper for basic compliance “impractical”. It adds that the absence of a formal approval regime, together with the lack of clear criteria for national competent authorities to determine whether a white paper has been “duly notified”, “may result in low-quality information being provided to investors”. ESMA recommends two things: criteria for determining when a white paper has been duly notified, and centralisation of the Title II notification process at ESMA, “thereby removing NCAs from their intermediary role”. It argues that the technical validation already run through its white paper register covers a substantial part of the completeness and formatting checks.

Centralising notification is a different thing from approval. The response describes the absence of an approval regime as part of the problem without proposing one, and Article 140(2)(c) separately requires the Commission to assess whether an approval mechanism is needed. For a Title II offeror, ESMA’s proposal is a possible future change of recipient and of the definition of a complete filing, with no legal effect unless the Commission proposes, and the co-legislators adopt, an amendment. The Article 8(4) explanation and the iXBRL format are the parts it leaves alone.

Transfer services and the Article 60 route for investment firms

Article 60(3) lets an investment firm provide crypto-asset services equivalent to the investment services and activities for which it is authorised under MiFID II, after notifying its home competent authority at least 40 working days before starting. The Article sets out eight equivalences: custody and administration, operating a trading platform, exchange for funds or other crypto-assets, execution of orders, placing, reception and transmission of orders, advice and portfolio management. Transfer services for crypto-assets on behalf of clients are not on that list.

ESMA’s Q&A 2071, answered on 20 June 2024, settled the consequence. ESMA’s summary of the Commission’s answer says that providing transfer services is “a distinct and self-standing crypto-asset service” under Article 3(1)(16)(j) and Article 3(1)(26), that an activity meeting the definition needs authorisation under Article 59 even when provided as part of another crypto-asset service, and that the Article 82 obligations apply. For a MiFID firm using the notification route, that means a separate CASP authorisation for the transfer leg of a service it is otherwise allowed to provide. ESMA’s supervisory convergence work found that outcome hard to justify where the transfer is “intrinsically linked” to the equivalent investment service, because investor protection, governance and risk management are already supervised under MiFID II.

The proposed fix is narrow. MiCA would state that, for investment firms notifying under Article 60, transfer services equivalent to investment services already authorised under MiFID II do not require a licence under Article 63. The response addresses only the licence; it says nothing about whether the Article 82 transfer-service agreement and ESMA’s Article 82(2) guidelines on transfer services would continue to apply to those firms. Credit institutions sit on different footing, since Article 60(1) lets them notify for crypto-asset services generally.

CASP capital: Annex IV classes and the fixed-overheads calculation

Article 67(1) requires a CASP to hold prudential safeguards of at least the higher of two amounts: the permanent minimum capital in Annex IV for the services it provides, and one quarter of the fixed overheads of the preceding year, reviewed annually. Annex IV sets EUR 50,000 for Class 1 services (including execution, placing, transfer, reception and transmission, advice and portfolio management), EUR 125,000 for Class 2 (adding custody and exchange) and EUR 150,000 for Class 3 (adding the operation of a trading platform). Article 67(3) fixes how fixed overheads are derived: total expenses after distribution of profits, minus a closed list of four items, namely profit-dependent staff bonuses and remuneration, employees’, directors’ and partners’ shares in profits, other fully discretionary profit appropriations and variable remuneration, and non-recurring expenses from non-ordinary activities.

ESMA reports NCA concern that these requirements do not capture differences in risk between business models, for example an entity providing a single Class 3 service against one providing every crypto-asset service, or a group operating under one authorisation against several licences. It also notes the asymmetry with notifying entities: Article 60(10) disapplies Article 67 to firms using the notification route, so a MiFID firm adding crypto-asset services by notification sees no change to its prudential requirements. The proposal is to align CASP capital with the IFR and IFD by deleting the limitative list in Article 67(3), so that further variable costs can be deducted as they are under the investment firm regime. Arithmetically, more permitted deductions produce a lower fixed-overheads figure, so the change would matter for CASPs whose requirement is set by one quarter of fixed overheads instead of the Annex IV amount. That is my reading; ESMA does not quantify the effect.

ESMA also flags that Annex IV “currently reads like” the Class 2 requirement is triggered only where both a Class 1 and a Class 2 service are provided. That drafting point does not lower anyone’s floor today. ESMA’s Q&A 2343, answered on 12 December 2024, already states that the minimum “should be the one applicable to whichever of its services requires the higher minimum capital requirement”: EUR 125,000 for a CASP providing only Class 2 services, and EUR 150,000 for one providing only Class 3 services or Class 1 and Class 3 together. A custody-only CASP that recalculates on the strength of ESMA’s Annex IV comment would be misreading both documents. A separate Q&A on the Article 67(3) calculation (ESMA_QA_2349) was answered by the Commission on 18 February 2026: fixed overheads are calculated from the total of all overhead expenses, fixed and variable, and only the items listed in Article 67(3)(a) to (d) may be subtracted, which is the closed list ESMA proposes to delete.

Marketing, influencers and the cost of “zero commission”

ESMA describes “extensive and disputable marketing activities” and argues that MiCA’s marketing provisions are “very high level”. Article 66(2) requires CASPs to provide information that is fair, clear and not misleading, including in marketing communications. ESMA identifies two enforcement gaps. MiCA’s market abuse provisions in Title VI reach false or misleading information, but a recommendation or prediction that is neither leaves supervisors without an enforcement tool. And influencers or third parties promoting crypto-assets for issuers and CASPs are outside MiCA altogether.

The asks follow from those gaps. ESMA invites the Commission to reflect on banning certain marketing practices, or limiting them for certain types of crypto-assets, “in line with the approach in MiFID II”, and suggests conflict-of-interest disclosure or transparency of previous recommendations. It proposes obligations for influencers and third parties promoting crypto-assets and crypto-asset services, with matching NCA powers. It also wants specific powers against third-country firms that actively solicit EU investors without MiCA authorisation, so that the Article 61 reverse solicitation exemption is interpreted consistently and “in as narrow a way as possible”. ESMA’s existing reverse solicitation guidelines already construe solicitation broadly, so this ask concerns enforcement tools.

The cost proposal starts from an example. ESMA has seen CASPs offering exchange services claim zero commission and tight spreads when the spread applied is high enough to recoup, or exceed, the commission forgone. Article 66(4) today requires CASPs to publish their policies on pricing, costs and fees in a prominent place on their website. ESMA proposes requirements for CASPs providing execution, reception and transmission of orders, and exchange services to give investors “full cost information”, so that clients know the cost components of their transactions and can compare platforms. The gap it describes lies between a published policy and the cost a client actually bears on a trade, spread included.

Staking, lending and borrowing: conduct rules without a new licence

Staking already has a MiCA treatment, set by Q&A rather than by the Regulation. ESMA’s Q&A 2067, answered by the Commission on 20 June 2024, states that MiCA contains no staking-specific provisions and does not prohibit staking, but that staking services provided by intermediaries holding clients’ crypto-assets or private keys are ancillary to custody and require authorisation for custody and administration under Article 75. Losses from the staking service and the underlying staking activity are deemed attributable to the CASP under Article 75(8), and where staking is combined with other crypto-asset services the CASP should obtain explicit client consent.

ESMA’s response accepts that staking is “a core technical function” of proof-of-stake networks that “should not automatically be treated as lending or portfolio management”. The risks it lists are marketing that overstates rewards, slashing, lock-up and unbonding liquidity risk, unclear segregation in an insolvency, and reliance on third-country infrastructure. It asks for targeted conduct, disclosure and safeguarding requirements for staking by authorised CASPs, distinguishing four arrangements: self-directed staking with no intermediary, technical staking services, pooled or custodial staking, and liquid or yield-bearing staking products that may raise separate classification issues. The disclosures it names are rewards, lock-up and unbonding periods, slashing risk, validator selection, fees, operational dependencies and insolvency treatment, with additional governance, conflict-of-interest and risk-management requirements where a CASP exercises discretion over validators, pools client assets or uses affiliated or third-country entities. ESMA explicitly prefers this to “a new heavy authorisation regime”.

Lending and borrowing are not on MiCA’s list of crypto-asset services, and Article 142(2)(b) had already asked the Commission to assess the necessity and feasibility of regulating them. On lending, ESMA describes cascading failures when CASPs borrow clients’ crypto-assets, sometimes without collateral, and on-lend them, and observes that custody and segregation requirements stop applying once the assets are lent out. Clients are often not told who the borrowers are, how loans are allocated, what collateral is posted or the gross yield generated. ESMA asks the Commission to clarify that CASPs offering or facilitating lending are subject to rules such as “client express written consent” and disclosure requirements, and states that its proposal “is not to create a newly regulated service requiring authorisation”. The same sentence also names collateral rules and a limit on the yield retained by the CASP, and its drafting leaves unclear whether those form part of the proposal.

Borrowing gets the more detailed treatment. ESMA wants targeted conduct, disclosure and risk-management requirements for CASPs offering or facilitating borrowing, “particularly where services are offered to retail clients or involve leverage”, and distinguishes collateralised borrowing, margin or leveraged borrowing linked to trading, borrowing through DeFi protocols accessed via a CASP, and arrangements involving rehypothecation or recursive leverage. The categories are meant to calibrate requirements, and ESMA says they are not mutually exclusive. Disclosures would cover collateral, liquidation mechanisms, rehypothecation, affiliated counterparties, protocol risks and insolvency treatment, plus a clear explanation of automatic liquidation and of losses exceeding posted collateral.

New powers: website take-downs, asset freezes and permanent product intervention

Two of ESMA’s power requests target unauthorised service providers and suspicious activity. The first would give NCAs explicit legal powers to order the removal of scam or unauthorised websites, a response to fraudulent domains registered and hosted outside the jurisdictions where victims live. The second would give ESMA, in addition to powers granted to NCAs, direct power to require a CASP to “immediately freeze” specific crypto-assets where there are reasonable grounds to suspect a link to market abuse, other financial crime, money laundering or terrorist financing, for as long as needed for investigation and enforcement by national enforcement authorities and competent authorities under Directive (EU) 2015/849. ESMA’s rationale is that current procedures are slow and suspicious assets are often gone by the time a freeze is requested. The response does not specify how an order would reach a CASP, any maximum duration, or how it would interact with a CASP’s own AML/CFT obligations.

The product intervention request would change ESMA’s own toolkit. Under Article 103, ESMA may temporarily prohibit or restrict the marketing, distribution or sale of crypto-assets other than ARTs and EMTs, must review a measure at least every six months, and may move to annual renewal after at least two consecutive renewals, based on an analysis of the impact on consumers. Article 105 gives NCAs their own powers, and under Article 106(2) ESMA (or the EBA, for ARTs and EMTs) issues an opinion on each national measure notified to it.

ESMA calls the cycle of temporary measures and short-term renewals “lengthy and unnecessarily burdensome”, and the replication of its measures through national permanent measures, each with its own ESMA opinion, a source of “excessive regulatory complexity”. It asks for power to adopt permanent product intervention measures, whether or not the MISP transfer goes ahead, and notes that without the MISP separate enforcement powers would have to be granted to ESMA for that purpose. For ARTs and EMTs, the temporary power in Article 104 sits with the EBA, and the response does not say whether a permanent power would follow the same split.

Tokenised securities and the MiCA-MiFID boundary

ESMA’s opening and closing sections step outside MiCA. It finds investor protection under MiCA narrower than, and distinct from, the framework for traditional financial instruments, and says the co-existence of traditional providers and crypto specialists creates “the risk of duplicative requirements and legal uncertainty”. Its final section argues that the EU should adopt clearer rules for tokenising existing securities and provide reliable on-chain settlement options, citing persistent uncertainty over issuance, legal title, custody, settlement finality and cross-border enforceability. Over time, ESMA suggests, an optional EU-level “28th regime” could provide a consistent basis for issuing, transferring and settling tokenised securities across Member States without first harmonising every relevant area of national law, and could also cover cases where DLT is used for existing legacy arrangements.

ESMA and the EBA: how the two responses divide the MiCA review

Every cell in the “MiCA today” column of the proposal map still describes the operative rule, and the response itself alters no reporting template, notification form or deadline. Read next to the EBA’s paper, it shows how the two authorities’ input divides. The EBA’s response of 24 September 2026 concentrated on the issuer side, covering reserve and liquidity requirements, significance criteria, redemption, multi-issuance and reporting for MiCA purposes, and marked most of the consultation’s CASP subsections as outside its input. ESMA’s paper is weighted toward CASPs and Title II offerors.

Classification and crypto lending appear in both papers, and the EBA’s lending input also covers CASP access to DeFi lending protocols, although it marked the consultation’s separate DeFi subsection as outside its input. CASP capital is a third shared area. The EBA gave no input on the consultation’s CASP prudential subsection, but its answer on issuer capital supports proposals to clarify CASP capital requirements on two points: aligning them with the IFR/IFD, including deleting the Article 67 list of deductible variable costs, and assessing whether the current approach captures the risk profile of a CASP carrying out several services within Class 2 or Class 3. On each of those areas, the Commission has two supervisory views to weigh.

Frequently Asked Questions

We are an electronic money institution that issues an EMT and also transfers it for clients. Does ESMA’s transfer-service proposal help us?

Not directly. Article 60(4) already gives an EMI a notification route for custody and transfer services relating to the e-money tokens it issues. That route does not extend to tokens issued by others, so transferring third-party EMTs requires CASP authorisation, and ESMA’s proposed carve-out is written for investment firms notifying under Article 60.

We are a credit institution that notified under Article 60(1). Would IFR/IFD alignment change our capital for crypto-asset services?

The proposal would amend the Article 67(3) calculation, and Article 60(10) disapplies Article 67 to notifying entities, whose capital continues to come from their own prudential framework. ESMA uses notifying entities as the comparison point for its level-playing-field argument, but the change it proposes would apply to CASPs authorised under Article 63.

A third-country exchange tells us EU clients approach it on their own initiative. Does the review change the reverse solicitation test?

The test in Article 61 and ESMA’s reverse solicitation guidelines applies as it stands today. The exemption is available only to third-country firms and cannot be relied on by EU-based firms, and the guidelines treat solicitation on behalf of a third-country firm by an EU-regulated entity, such as a bank redirecting clients from its website, as a breach.

Our product is a liquid staking token. Which part of ESMA’s paper applies?

Classification first. ESMA’s fourth staking category, liquid or yield-bearing staking products, is flagged as potentially raising separate classification issues under MiCA, MiFID II or other frameworks, and where staking results in a separate token ESMA says that token “may require an independent classification assessment”. For a Title II token, that analysis feeds the Article 8(4) explanation before any staking-specific conduct rule comes into play.

If white paper notification moved to ESMA, would our home Member State still matter?

The response is silent on that. Its proposal would centralise the Title II notification process at ESMA and remove NCAs from their intermediary role, without addressing the home Member State concept, the list of host Member States that Article 8(6) requires with the notification, or how an NCA would supervise an offeror whose white paper it no longer receives.

Does ESMA’s paper propose changes to ART and EMT significance thresholds or reserve rules?

No. Its stablecoin proposal concerns CASP services in relation to tokens that do not comply with MiCA, and it does not address the significance criteria, own funds or reserve-of-assets rules for issuers. Those were the subject of the EBA’s response, so issuers tracking reserve or significance changes need the EBA paper alongside ESMA’s.

Does the response cover DORA, sustainability disclosures or the travel rule?

No. ESMA’s paper does not mention DORA, the sustainability indicators CASPs publish under Article 66(5) or transfer-of-funds data, so obligations under those frameworks are untouched by it; the nearest point is the “operational and cybersecurity safeguards” listed among the obligations for its proposed DeFi gateway service. The consultation itself included a subsection on environmental and sustainability reporting, so other respondents’ answers, and the Commission’s report, may still deal with those topics.

Related Articles

• MiCA Review: The EBA’s Priorities for Token Issuers and CASPs: the issuer-side response that ESMA’s paper complements, covering reserves, significance and reporting.
• EC MiCAR Review: What European CASPs Should Submit: how the Commission structured the consultation that ESMA is answering.
• ESMA CAFI Guidelines: When a Crypto-Asset Is a Financial Instrument: the classification test that binding ESMA opinions would build on.
• MiCA CASP Wind-Down: What Unauthorised Providers Must Do as the Transitional Period Ends on 1 July 2026: the client-asset steps for firms left without authorisation.
• FATF DeFi Report: When Control Brings a DeFi Arrangement Within the FATF Standards: the AML control test that parallels ESMA’s DeFi gateway proposal.
• MiCAR Reporting Obligations: what CASPs and token issuers report under MiCA today.

Key Takeaways

• CASPs still holding non-compliant ARTs or EMTs in custody for EU clients have a reason to inventory those positions now: the January 2025 statement left custody and transfer open, and, on a literal reading, ESMA’s “any licensable service” wording would close that if adopted as drafted.
• For custody-only and exchange-only CASPs, the Annex IV component of the Article 67 requirement is EUR 125,000 under Q&A 2343, and ESMA’s drafting point on Annex IV does not alter that figure unless Annex IV itself is amended.
• Until Article 67(3) is amended, only its four listed items may be deducted when calculating fixed overheads; CASPs whose requirement is set by overheads are the ones an IFR-style list would affect.
• Investment firms hoping to drop a CASP licence for transfers should note that ESMA’s carve-out would remove the Article 63 licence only; the response is silent on Article 82 and the transfer-service guidelines.
• Desks offering derivatives settled in ARTs or EMTs have ESMA’s view that stablecoin settlement should not stop MiFID II classification, but no legal clarification yet; classification stays a case-by-case assessment under the existing guidelines.
• CASPs offering staking can benchmark current client disclosures against ESMA’s list: rewards, lock-up and unbonding, slashing, validator selection, fees, operational dependencies and insolvency treatment.

Sources and References

• ESMA, Response to the EC Consultation on the review of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114 (MiCA), ESMA75-113276571-1721 (30 September 2026): ESMA (PDF)
• Regulation (EU) 2023/1114 on markets in crypto-assets (MiCA), including Articles 3, 8, 60, 61, 66, 67, 75, 82, 97, 103 to 106, 109, 140, 142, 143, Recital 22 and Annex IV: EUR-Lex
• European Commission, Targeted consultation on the review of the MiCA Regulation (closing 30 September 2026, 23:59 CEST): finance.ec.europa.eu
• European Commission, Commission seeks feedback on the functioning of EU crypto-assets rules (20 May 2026): finance.ec.europa.eu
• EBA, Response to the EC targeted consultation on the review of MiCA (24 September 2026): EBA (PDF)
• ESMA, Public Statement on the provision of certain crypto-asset services in relation to non-MiCA compliant ARTs and EMTs, ESMA75-223375936-6099 (17 January 2025): ESMA (PDF)
• ESMA Q&A 2404, scope of public offering: esma.europa.eu
• ESMA Q&A 2071, crypto-asset transfers as a component of another service or as a separate transfer service: esma.europa.eu
• ESMA Q&A 2067, treatment of staking services in MiCA (answered 20 June 2024): esma.europa.eu
• ESMA Q&A 2343, minimum capital requirements for CASPs (answered 12 December 2024): esma.europa.eu
• ESMA Interactive Single Rulebook, MiCA Annex IV minimum capital requirements: esma.europa.eu
• ESMA Q&A 2349, calculation of fixed overheads under Article 67(3) (answered by the Commission, 18 February 2026): esma.europa.eu
• ESMA, Final Report on the Guidelines on the conditions and criteria for the qualification of crypto-assets as financial instruments, ESMA75453128700-1323: ESMA (PDF)
• ESMA, Final Report on the guidelines on reverse solicitation under MiCA, ESMA35-1872330276-1899 (17 December 2024): ESMA (PDF)
• ESMA, Final Report on guidelines specifying certain requirements of MiCA on investor protection (third package), ESMA35-1872330276-1936, including the Article 82(2) guidelines on transfer services: ESMA (PDF)
• Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2024/2984 on standard forms, formats and templates for crypto-asset white papers (applicable from 23 December 2025): EUR-Lex
• ESMA, Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation page (white paper iXBRL requirements, interim MiCA register): esma.europa.eu
• ESMA, List of grandfathering periods decided by Member States under Article 143 of MiCA: ESMA (PDF)
• ESMA news, ESMA welcomes the Commission’s proposal on market integration and supervision (4 December 2025): esma.europa.eu
• Directive 2014/65/EU (MiFID II): EUR-Lex
• Regulation (EU) 2019/2033 (IFR) and Directive (EU) 2019/2034 (IFD): IFR on EUR-Lex and IFD on EUR-Lex
• Directive (EU) 2015/849 (Anti-Money Laundering Directive): EUR-Lex

Next checkpoint: the Commission’s Article 140 report by 30 June 2027

The next dated step for the Commission in the MiCA review is its report under Article 140(1), due by 30 June 2027 after consulting the EBA and ESMA. The artifact worth producing before that date is a process-by-process map of the twelve rows in the proposal map above, with an owner for each.

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