The following is a guest position and an opinion from Sveinn Valfells, co-founder of Monerium.
Mario Draghi rightly. Europe is drunk with substantial pricesincluding regulations on “the most innovative part of the service sector – digital”. The European Union has done exactly this by creating prices on Stablecoins, a practical form of digital money could give a significant positive impact on GDP.
The promise of stablecoins for Europe
Stablecoins are digital money on blockchains – dollars, euros or sterling as cryptographic pieces. They are the new ones “killer application“Fintech and programmable species that move peers without intermediaries – instantly with almost no cost – supplying global payments and applications such as automated loans and titles trading.
Stablecoins allow fintechs to create new applications faster and cheaper than ever. They allow “Bank open to steroids“Twice by undressing the money from banks, payment providers and their closed fintech technologies closed. They are”Ambient temperature superconductors for financial services“Who eliminates obstacles to silver flow, considerably increasing GDP.
Stablecoins are more than an abstract financial innovation. They left a Polish worker in France to send their euros back to house instantly for hundreds instead of paying Several euros and waiting up to two days. They allow German start-ups to effectively increase capital Thanks to an automated program of compliant digital actions and debts instead of slow, expensive and inflexible manual documents.
To unlock the potential of stablecoins, the currencies of Europe must be accessible at the national and international level as Euros, Zloty and Krona Onchain. The good news is that Europe has a tested legal framework for digital species called electronics, introduced in 2000. The bad news is that Europe has hampered by enveloping the onchain emitted by the currency with a thick layer of useless paperwork.
How mica creates unfair obstacles for innovation
The electronic monhone is a great regulatory innovation. It’s a Digital instrument cash bearer For payments. Dozens of companies, including Paypal, Revolut and Wise, have successfully used electronic money to serve millions of customers in billions of online, mobile and cards. The electronic monhone is the ultimate form of Stablecoin, as if it were made for the onchain economy.
The newly adopted EU market in crypto-active regulations (Mica) require that stablecoins be electronic money. It makes a lot of meaning because the electronic monhone animates blockchains and mica as a “technically neutral“Form of digital cash.
However, mica violates the technical neutrality of electronic money and imposes anti -competitive prices and restrictions by creating additional requirements for the onchain of electronic money.
For example, Mica transforms banks into goalkeepers for emitting electronic currency issuers. Unlike ordinary electronic money which can be 100% protected directly in high -quality liquid assets such as state bonds, mica requires that stablecoin transmitters protect at least 30% of their customers’ funds with banks, which forced them to share their income with banks. It is a direct rate payable to banks.
The MICA bank’s safeguarding obligation also makes ONCHAIN in e-mail more risky because it inserts banks and their balance sheets where they do not need to be. The higher risk of holding money with banks is a price because it forces electronic weapon issuers to hold larger reserves.
The MICA Bank’s safeguarding obligation is also illegal. He directly violates the European electronic money directive which explicitly declares that one of its key objectives is to ensure “fair competition” and a “playground” between electronic money issuers and banks. The safeguarding obligation of the Mica bank is exactly the opposite: it moves the rules of the game in favor of the banks.
Level the rules of the game
Americans like to denigrate European regulations and have no stable regulations. Nevertheless, the Trump administration has prioritized by adopting a Stablecoin invoice Reflecting European electronic money to “ensure the domination of the US dollar internationally (and) to increase the use of the US dollar digitally”.
Meanwhile, the EU hides by making regulations in proven electronic curve and tested more anti-competitive, expensive and risky for European stablecoins. As Draghi says: “A fundamental change in mentality” is necessary.
The solution is simple. Firstly, the EU should remove all specific blockchain requirements for electronic difference and tear off unnecessary administrative formalities outside the most sensible mica regulations.
Second, the ECB (and other EU central banks) should further level the rules of the game between banks and electronic weapons.
How? The ECB recently granted non -banking fintechs, including electronic weapon issuers, Direct access to ECB’s payment systems. This helps emitting electronic weapons by giving them direct access to the same basic payment systems as banks.
The ECB should take one more step and give electronic money issuers direct access to its backup facilities. The main IMF economists have already proposed this idea. This would remove all the unnecessary guards and prices between the ECB and the issuers of the Euro stables and helping to unlock the full potential of the onchain economy for Europe and the Euro.
