The Payments Industry Enters MiCA's Stablecoin Perimeter: Bridge Joins the Register
The MiCA register's e-money token column added a notable name. In its latest update, published on Wednesday 5 August, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) added Bridge Building, the Luxembourg-based entity behind the Stripe-owned stablecoin infrastructure company Bridge, to the register as an authorised e-money token issuer. The addition brings the register to 22 authorised EMT issuers, listed across 42 white paper records, since several issuers hold entries for multiple tokens. The same update added three German crypto-asset service providers (CASPs), Volksbank Die Gestalterbank, VBU Volksbank im Unterland and VR-Bank Erding, bringing the total number of authorised CASPs to 324.
The Bridge entry carries weight beyond the count. Stripe acquired Bridge in a deal that placed a major payments company directly into stablecoin infrastructure, and Bridge secured both a CASP authorisation under MiCA and an Electronic Money Institution licence from Luxembourg's Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF), first announced on 2 July. The authorisation allows businesses across the EU to build stablecoin and payment products under a single regulated framework. The arrival of Stripe-backed infrastructure signals that the payments industry is entering MiCA's stablecoin perimeter directly.
The register has been moving at pace. The CASP total has climbed from 294 in mid-July to 324 now, and the EMT register gained its 22nd issuer. The composition continues a pattern visible across the post-deadline updates: German cooperative lenders and payments-oriented firms entering alongside established institutions, with the licensed market increasingly reflecting the structure of European banking. The crypto-native exchanges that dominated the pre-deadline surge now sit within a broader mix.
The asset-referenced token register told a different story. The update showed no change to ART authorisations, with no ART issuers listed. That column has stayed empty since MiCA came into full application, a gap worth watching as the European Commission's MiCA review consultation examines the treatment of asset-referenced structures. The list of non-compliant crypto-asset companies was also unchanged.
For firms building payment or stablecoin products in the EU, Bridge's authorisation is a reference point. It confirms that the EMI and CASP route through a single Member State, in this case Luxembourg, can carry a payments-infrastructure business into the EU market under MiCA. For the wider market, the distance between a growing EMT register and an empty ART register continues to define where MiCA authorisation is proving workable and where it remains untested.
What to watch: the MiCA register is republished weekly, so the perimeter will continue to shift through the second half of 2026. The European Commission's MiCA review consultation remains open until 30 September 2026, with the treatment of stablecoins and asset-referenced structures within its scope. ESMA's first common supervisory action under MiCA, announced on 8 July and examining the digital operational resilience of CASPs' custody services, runs from the second half of 2026 into the first half of 2027, with a consolidated report expected to reach ESMA's Board of Supervisors in the second half of 2027.
For firms assessing disclosure quality across this expanding register, our White Paper Tracker offers a comparative view of MiCA white papers, assessed against the methodology set out in Commission Implementing Regulation 2024/2984, and flags where a project's disclosures meet, exceed or fall short of the standard.
Explore our White Paper Tracker: https://www.micacryptoalliance.com/white-paper-tracker
Sources
- ESMA Interim MiCA Register, last update 5 August 2026 (https://www.esma.europa.eu/esmas-activities/digital-finance-and-innovation/markets-crypto-assets-regulation-mica)
- ESMA, "ESMA launches Common Supervisory Action on CASPs' digital operational resilience for custody," 8 July 2026 (https://www.esma.europa.eu/press-news/esma-news/esma-launches-common-supervisory-action-casps-digital-operational-resilience)
- Cointelegraph (https://cointelegraph.com/news/bridge-mica-stablecoin-issuer-esma-register)
