UniCredit executive Elena Carletti stated that under the MiCA framework, the EU may find it difficult to contain the banking shock related to crypto businesses as quickly as the US handled the Silicon Valley banking crisis in 2023. She believes that existing European tools are insufficient to provide the same level of support for large stablecoin reserve accounts.
MiCA links stablecoins to banks.
According to MiCA rules, issuers of stablecoins classified as electronic money tokens are required to allocate reserves in highly liquid assets, including bank deposits and government securities. This makes the stability of stablecoins more directly affected by bank balance sheets.
Carletti stated at a conference in Madrid that the systemic risk exception granted to Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank in the United States would not be easily replicated in Europe. At that time, US regulators guaranteed all deposits, including those from stablecoin companies.
The Circle case has been brought up again.
She mentioned that when Silicon Valley Bank collapsed in March 2023, Circle, the issuer of USDC, had $3.3 billion in reserves held by the bank. After the news was disclosed, USDC temporarily deviated from its peg to the US dollar, and the market gradually stabilized only after US regulators announced the protection of all deposits.
In her view, Europe has not yet addressed this type of risk transmission: if stablecoin reserves are concentrated in banks, and those banks experience liquidity or credit problems, the EU's existing deposit insurance mechanism may not be sufficient to withstand the shock. The EU's deposit insurance cap is currently €100,000, which is insufficient to cover large stablecoin reserve accounts.
European banks are advancing stablecoin initiatives.
This statement comes as European banks are accelerating their entry into the stablecoin and crypto services sector. UniCredit is a founding member of the Qivalis consortium, which plans to launch a MiCA-compliant euro stablecoin in the second half of 2026.
Another founding member, the Italian bank Banca Sella, has recently received approval from the Bank of Italy to provide crypto custody and transfer services under the MiCA notification pathway. As MiCA becomes more fully implemented by July 2026, the EU will continue to tighten its regulations on crypto asset servicers, stablecoin issuers, and certain DeFi front-ends.
Additional information:Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino had previously criticized MiCA's reserve requirements, saying that placing 60% of cash reserves in uninsured bank deposits could amplify systemic risk.
