EU finance groups push to remove tokenized securities cap
European finance and tokenization groups say Brussels should remove limits on assets admitted to DLT infrastructure or set a 1.5 trillion euro baseline if a cap remains.
Asanat Analysis — Why it matters
The EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) framework included guardrails on tokenized securities issuance on distributed ledger technology (DLT) infrastructure—essentially a sandbox cap designed to manage systemic risk during the experimental phase. This push to remove or materially raise the limit signals that institutional adoption of blockchain-based settlement has progressed beyond pilot scale, with real demand from banks and asset managers now constrained by regulatory thresholds rather than technical capability or market interest.
The proposed 1.5 trillion euro baseline is instructive: it's high enough to accommodate major European equity and bond issuance while nominally retaining a cap. This reflects a negotiation strategy where industry actors acknowledge regulators' need for guardrails while arguing the current ceiling (€100B in some reading of MiCA's phased approach) no longer maps to actual risk. Success here would validate the DLT settlement thesis in regulated markets and likely accelerate competitive pressure on traditional central securities depositories.
The regulatory narrative is shifting from 'tokenization as experiment' to 'tokenization as infrastructure,' though fragmented EU adoption remains a constraint. If Brussels acts, expect similar moves in UK, Singapore, and Hong Kong—creating a global arbitrage where jurisdictions compete on tokenization-friendly frameworks.