MiCA Review, ECB Settlement Plans and Ireland's Crypto Exclusion

‍European Commission Extends MiCA Review Deadline as Public Consultation Closes 

The European Commission's public consultation on the functioning of MiCA closed on 31 August, marking one milestone in a two-track review process that will shape the next version of the regulation. A separate targeted consultation, aimed at crypto-asset industry representatives, national and European supervisors, central banks and ministries of finance, was launched the same week in May and has since been extended to 30 September. Both consultations feed into reports the Commission must prepare under Articles 140 and 142 of MiCA, covering the regulation's application and developments in crypto-asset markets that currently sit outside its scope, and may be accompanied by a legislative proposal.

The scope under review includes stablecoins, crypto-asset service providers, DeFi, staking, lending and tokenised assets. For CASPs and issuers, the responses gathered over the summer will inform how the Commission weighs whether MiCA's current perimeter, from staking's ancillary treatment under the custody provisions to the absence of a standalone regime for lending and borrowing, still matches the market it was designed for.

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ECB Argues Central Bank Money Should Anchor Tokenised Settlement

Speaking at the Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium on 28 August, ECB Executive Board member Isabel Schnabel set out her case for central bank money as the settlement asset for tokenised financial markets. Her argument centres on elasticity: a stablecoin issuer can hold strong reserves and offer reliable redemption, but it cannot expand liquidity on demand during a period of stress, since only a central bank can do that. She described stablecoins as complements to central bank money, capable of supporting new payment instruments and forms of digital economic activity.

Schnabel also confirmed that the Eurosystem's Pontes project launches this Septemberf, connecting the TARGET real-time gross settlement system with market DLT platforms. Legal settlement finality for the cash leg will sit in TARGET2 at launch, moving to the Eurosystem's own DLT platform in later phases that add smart contracts and continuous operations. The broader architecture question, whether Europe settles on a single unified ledger or several interoperable ones, remains under exploration through the Eurosystem's Project Appia.

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Ireland Excludes Crypto Assets From New Retail Investment Account

On 31 August, Ireland's Department of Finance published its Roadmap for the Taxation of Retail Investment, setting out a new Investment Account for individual savers. Eligible holdings will include listed shares, listed bonds, instruments traded on a regulated market, and eligible investment funds including ETFs. Derivatives and crypto assets are excluded, categorised in the roadmap among "highly complex and risky products."

The account is due to be legislated for in Finance (No. 2) Bill 2026, with availability planned for 2027 and specific thresholds and contribution limits to be set in Budget 2027. The exclusion follows Ireland's June National Risk Assessment on money laundering and terrorist financing, which separatelyflagged the misuse of crypto assets among the threats under review by Irish authorities. For firms serving Irish retail clients, the exclusion is a reminder that MiCA authorisation opens the regulated market for crypto services without guaranteeing crypto assets a place inside adjacent retail savings vehicles.

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What to watch:

• The two MiCA review consultations, closing 31 August for the public track and 30 September for the targeted one, will together shape whether the Commission proposes legislative changes to MiCA's scope, particularly around staking, lending and the treatment of non-EU stablecoin issuers.
• The Eurosystem's Pontes project goes live in September, a first concrete step toward on-chain central bank settlement that will influence how tokenised markets and MiCA-regulated stablecoins interact going forward.
• Ireland's exclusion of crypto assets from its new Investment Account may prompt similar boundary-setting decisions in other member states now that MiCA authorisation is broadly in place.

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For a current view of authorisations and white paper records across the EU, our White Paper Tracker (micacryptoalliance.com/white-paper-tracker) draws directly on ESMA's register.

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Sources:

European Commission, Targeted consultation on the review of the MiCA Regulation https://finance.ec.europa.eu/regulation-and-supervision/consultations-0/targeted-consultation-review-mica-regulation_en

European Commission, Have Your Say: public consultation on the evaluation of the EU crypto-asset markets legal framework https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/17912-Crypto-asset-markets-evaluation-of-the-EU-legal-framework/public-consultation_en

European Central Bank, Isabel Schnabel, "Central banks on-chain," Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium, 28 August 2026 https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2026/html/ecb.sp260828~fe9afc86e8.en.html

Government of Ireland, Department of Finance, "Tánaiste Simon Harris and Minister of State Robert Troy publish Roadmap for the Taxation of Retail Investment," 31 August 2026 https://www.gov.ie/en/department-of-finance/press-releases/t%C3%A1naiste-simon-harris-and-minister-of-state-robert-troy-publish-roadmap-for-the-taxation-of-retail-investment/

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