EU Lawmakers urges to examine whether DeFi, Staking & NFTs need MiCA-style rules

A European Parliament committee is pushing the European Union to take a closer look at whether crypto lending, staking, NFTs and decentralized finance deserve formal regulation, adding another layer to the bloc’s ongoing effort to refine its digital asset rulebook.

The push comes from a report tabled Friday and headed for vote. Beyond flagging those four areas for review, the report also pushes for wider use of tokenisation across financial services, support for euro-denominated stablecoins, and a broader look at whether more crypto activities should fall under the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation, or MiCA, as per Cointelegraph report,

Belgian MEP Johan Van Overtveldt authored the report on behalf of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, where it passed as an own-initiative resolution laying out the committee’s recommendations to the Commission. The full Parliament is expected to vote on it July 7. Passage would give Parliament an official stance on digital asset policy, but the resolution itself carries no power to change MiCA or impose new legal requirements directly.

On the stablecoin question, the report makes the case that a euro-denominated stablecoin could work alongside tokenized commercial bank deposits and wholesale central bank digital currencies, speeding up cross-border payments and cutting their cost in the process. The report frames this as more than a convenience: it argues that broader stablecoin adoption could boost the competitiveness of EU financial markets and elevate the euro’s standing internationally.

That framing tracks with where ECON has already been heading. On Tuesday, the committee threw its support behind digital euro legislation, with members arguing that public digital currency and private digital currency should be able to coexist rather than compete for the same space.

This report has been a long time coming. Van Overtveldt put forward an initial draft back in February, and ECON members spent months negotiating amendments before settling on the current text. That original draft stuck mostly to MiCA as it already exists, focusing on things like how stablecoins get classified and legal clarity for stablecoins issued by multiple entities at once.

The finalised, committee-approved version goes further on enforcement consistency. It calls on the EU to apply MiCA uniformly across all member states, warning that if individual countries start layering on their own extra requirements, it could splinter the EU’s crypto industry and undercut the level playing field MiCA was designed to create.