EU Economic Affairs Committee Urges Assessment of DeFi Staking and NFT Regulation Before MiCA Deadline

The European Parliament’s economic affairs committee has tabled a report calling on the European Commission to assess whether crypto lending and borrowing, staking, NFTs and decentralized finance should come under regulation signaling that MiCA may only be the beginning of Europe’s crypto rulebook.

The report, drafted by Belgian MEP Johan Van Overtveldt, will go before the full European Parliament for a vote on July 7. If adopted it becomes Parliament’s official position on digital asset policy but it does not amend MiCA or create new legal obligations on its own.

Europe Is Warming Up to Stablecoins — Especially Euro-Denominated Ones

One of the more striking elements of the report is its stance on stablecoins. The committee actively encouraged the development of euro-denominated stablecoins under MiCA, arguing they could complement tokenized bank deposits and wholesale CBDCs while enabling faster and cheaper cross-border payments.

That is a notable shift from Van Overtveldt’s own position in 2023, when he compared cryptocurrencies to drugs following the banking crisis linked to Silicon Valley Bank and USDC’s brief depeg.

The report also tied the broader adoption of euro stablecoins to strengthening the competitiveness of EU financial markets and the international role of the euro framing it as a strategic priority rather than just a regulatory question.

What Comes Next for MiCA

The European Commission is already running a public consultation on whether MiCA should be expanded to cover DeFi, staking, lending, NFTs and tokenized financial assets. The ECON report adds parliamentary weight to that conversation.

The committee also warned member states against layering national crypto rules on top of MiCA, saying fragmented national requirements would hurt the bloc’s digital asset industry and undermine the level playing field MiCA was designed to create.