When French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz recently unveiled their joint economic agenda to the Franco-German Council of Ministers, a proposal stood out: the continuation of collaboration and equivalence plans with third countries in the field of crypto-active regulations. It was recognition that digital money, like data, does not stop at borders. And it was a timely reminder that the Stablecoins – the fastest part of digital finance and crypto – will only fully succeed if the regulators correspond to their design without border with a cross -border collaboration.
Stablecoins: an upgrading of payments, not just a cryptography tool
Stablecoins are native money on the internet: always border without border, programmable and available for anyone with a smartphone. Unlike traditional payment rails, they do not close on weekends, do not count on banking networks of complex correspondents and can distance the value between Bangkok and Boston in a few seconds. In many ways, they are the first serious upgrade of cross -border payments since Swift in the 1970s. Where Swift was an innovation of messaging network to connect the counterpart banks, the Stablecoins marry messaging with the regulations to create a breakthrough of payment innovation.
But their value proposal depends on being global. A patchwork of divergent national rules would transform “the internet of value” into fragmented payment intranets – undergoing the even efficiency and accessibility that makes stable processors.
Converging principles, different paths
The good news: the main regulatory executives of the world for Stablecoins – European markets in the regulation of cryptocurrencies (Mica) and the American engineering law – already share the same foundation. Both require complete reserves 1: 1 on high-quality liquid assets, acquisitions to the SA, regular public reports and strict governance, risk and anti-flowage standards (LMA). The two allow the emission of banks and non-banks.
There are, of course, differences. Engineering imposes stricter reserve rules (limited to short -term treasury bills and benchmarks), while the Mica allows a wider mixture, including longer state obligations or even covered obligations, but also requires high minimum bank deposit ratios (30% or 60% of the reserve depending on the size of the token). Genius requires monthly certificates, while Mica requires a white paper at launch. Mica places emission ceilings on non -Euro -scale stable stables; Engineering creates strict obstacles for major technological transmitters and segregation requirements for banks aimed at launching stablecoins. These are examples of important differences, but they pale compared to the central alignment with what a safe and credible stable is like.
Foreign issuers: Multi-elaboration VS recognition
Where executives diverge the most in the way they treat foreign transmitters.
The genius presents a equivalence regime: Stablecoins from “comparable jurisdictions” could be offered directly in the United States without a double license. This means that in the future, subject to the approval of the US Treasury Department, the Euro floors in accordance with Mica could probably be offered to the entire American market without the need for additional local licenses.
MICA, on the other hand, obliges foreign transmitters to create an EU license entity and to comply with all local requirements, including the need for local reserves, emission and redemptions, and disclosure proportionate to the share of the EU of the assets and activities of the issuer – the so -called Multi-Disus approach.
This difference reflects more timing than philosophy: the EU went first, seeking to bring the global staboons within its perimeter after the balance published its first white paper in 2019. From its first impact assessments, Brussels warned not to allow non-Undue foreign issuers to escape surveillance. Mica even obliges the sharing of data by exchanges to help transmitters better calculate their EU footprint and allow supervisors to monitor the activities of foreign issuers. At the time when mica was adopted in 2023, it was too early to introduce a complete equivalence diet. However, the European Commission has been responsible for examining whether an equivalence regime could complete its approach in its provisional examination which is due this year. And the political signal is clear: Macron and Merz have explicitly called for cross -border collaboration and the construction of reciprocity mechanisms for stablecoins with trusted partners. Transatlantic stars align.
International collaboration cannot wait
The next 12 to 24 months will be decisive. With Mica and Genius as key frames, the objective of policy will go from the drafting of rules to align them. The opportunity is enormous: a coordinated transatlantic approach would give companies and consumers the confidence that a fully supported and transparent digital stable is the same payment instrument on each side of the Atlantic, independent of its license location. It would also give other significant savings a solid model to connect – guaranteeing Stablecoins to evolve in a global public good rather than a regulatory race downwards.
Not aligning would be expensive. Companies need stoves in several currencies to manage and modernize FX flows and global supply chains. Consumers also need access to liquid tokens, widely used on regulated local trading places. Without collaboration, the void will be filled either by unregulated offshore players, or by fragmented national systems which have cut themselves off from global liquidity, utility and economic activity.
The monetary suite of the Open Web
Two decades ago, regulators resisted Internet sculpture in national intranets – and the open web prospered. Today, we are facing monetary suite. Stablecoins can finish what the Internet has started: making the value itself as open, programmable and global as information.
If the EU, the United States and other jurisdictions enter this moment to strengthen recognition and reciprocity, the stablecoins will become the backbone of global trade in real time and will inaugurate a new era of global economic prosperity thanks to the exchange of cross-border value without friction.
