MiCA licence: who needs one, costs and earn products

Since 1 July 2026 any firm providing crypto-asset services in the EU needs authorisation under MiCA, and whether an earn, staking or vault product falls inside that requirement depends on which service the firm performs for its clients.

A MiCA licence is authorisation to act as a crypto-asset service provider (CASP) under Regulation (EU) 2023/1114, the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation. Article 59 bars any person from providing crypto-asset services in the EU without it, or without a notification route open to banks and other already-regulated firms. The transitional period that let existing firms keep operating under national rules ended on 1 July 2026. On 24 September 2026, ESMA's interim register listed 362 authorised or notified CASP entries covering 357 legal entities.

Each requirement here is cited to its article of MiCA or to the ESMA or Commission text that describes it. The material is general information about the regulation and doesn't constitute legal advice on any particular product.

Who needs a MiCA licence?

Any legal person that provides one or more of the ten crypto-asset services listed in Article 3(1)(16) of MiCA to clients in the EU needs authorisation under Article 63, unless it's an entity that can notify instead under Article 60. Authorised CASPs must have a registered office in a member state, effective management in the EU and at least one EU-resident director (Article 59(2)).

Definitions from Article 3(1)(17) to (26) of MiCA; capital classes from Annex IV. Each class includes the services of the classes below it, so a firm's class follows the highest-class service it's authorised for.

Three groups sit outside the authorisation requirement or reach it by another path:

• Already-regulated firms. Credit institutions, investment firms, central securities depositories, e-money institutions, UCITS management companies, AIFMs and market operators can provide some or all of these services by notifying their home regulator at least 40 working days in advance (Article 60), within the limits of their existing licence.
• Assets that are something else. MiCA doesn't apply to crypto-assets that qualify as financial instruments, deposits, funds (other than e-money tokens) or insurance and pension products (Article 2(4)). A tokenised share or fund unit falls under MiFID II or the fund directives instead, and ESMA has published guidelines on when a crypto-asset qualifies as a financial instrument.
• Fully decentralised services. Recital 22 says services provided "in a fully decentralised manner without any intermediary" fall outside MiCA, while activities that are only partly decentralised remain in scope. The regulation doesn't define the threshold, and Article 142(2)(a) asked the Commission to assess DeFi separately.

Firms outside the EU can't solicit EU clients without authorisation. Article 61 allows a third-country firm to serve an EU client only at that client's own exclusive initiative, and any solicitation or promotion in the EU cancels the exemption regardless of contractual disclaimers.

How much does a MiCA licence cost?

MiCA sets a capital floor for each class of service. Article 67 requires a CASP to hold the higher of the Annex IV minimum or one quarter of the previous year's fixed overheads, as own funds, an insurance policy or a combination of the two.

Source: MiCA Annex IV and Article 67, EUR-Lex.

For a firm with a sizeable cost base, the overheads test usually binds before the Annex IV floor. Application fees and ongoing supervisory levies are set by each national regulator, so they differ by member state, and the regulation itself sets no fee. Governance, AML and ICT systems, audited financial statements and legal work add to the cost of an application, and those costs depend on the services and the firm.

How to get a MiCA licence

An applicant files with the competent authority of its home member state, and the regulation fixes the review clock. The application under Article 62(2) must include, among other items:

• a programme of operations listing each service and where and how it will be marketed;
• proof of the Article 67 prudential safeguards;
• governance arrangements and fit-and-proper evidence for directors and qualifying shareholders;
• internal controls, risk management, AML and business continuity procedures;
• technical documentation of ICT and security systems; and
• the procedure for segregating clients' crypto-assets and funds.

The timeline in Article 63 runs in working days:

1. Acknowledgement of receipt within 5 working days.
2. A completeness check within 25 working days, with a deadline set for any missing information.
3. A reasoned decision within 40 working days of a complete application.
4. One request for further information, made by day 20 of the assessment, can suspend the clock for up to 20 working days.

The statutory clock adds up to roughly four months from filing when nothing is missing, and time spent answering completeness requests comes on top. Once authorised, a CASP can passport its services across the EU: it notifies its home regulator of the member states it plans to serve (Article 65), and can start there 15 calendar days after submitting that notice at the latest.

What changed after the 1 July 2026 deadline?

Article 143(3) let firms that were operating under national law before 30 December 2024 continue until 1 July 2026 or until their MiCA application was decided, whichever came first. The second subparagraph of Article 143(3) let member states shorten that period or skip it, so the cut-off came earlier in some countries, and from 1 July 2026 the transitional right ended everywhere.

ESMA's public statement of 23 June 2026 set out what it expects of firms left without authorisation. They must stop onboarding EU clients and cease marketing, limit services to what clients need to sell, transfer or close positions, and communicate a deadline after which residual positions close automatically. The statement also reminds non-EU firms that they can't serve EU clients in a business-to-business context either, and that custody can't be outsourced to an entity that isn't an authorised CASP.

The ESMA interim MiCA register, updated on 24 September 2026, showed the following:

• 362 CASP entries for 357 legal entities, of which 294 carry an authorisation or notification date before 1 July 2026 and 60 a date between 1 July and 24 September 2026.
• Germany leads by home state with 98 entries, many of them banks notifying under Article 60, followed by France (36), the Netherlands (29), Cyprus (25) and Malta (22).
• Service mix: 188 entries include custody, 85 reception and transmission of orders, 50 portfolio management and 20 the operation of a trading platform.
• 173 entries on ESMA's separate list of non-compliant entities, firms that a national authority has declared to be providing services without authorisation.
• 49 e-money token white papers from 24 issuers, the tokens usually described as MiCA-compliant stablecoins. Our comparison of euro stablecoins under MiCA covers the euro coins among them.

A handful of entries carry dates after 24 September 2026, which reflects the 40-working-day notice period for Article 60 notifications. The register is ESMA's interim version, compiled from national authorities' submissions, and ESMA directs clients to check it before using a provider.

Which major firms hold a MiCA licence?

Most of the large exchanges and brokers serving Europe, several neobanks and a growing group of banks appear on ESMA's interim register. The register covers both routes: Clearstream's entry, for example, records a notification to the CSSF under the Article 60 route open to already-regulated firms. The table lists a selection from the register as published on 24 September 2026, with the EU entity each firm uses and its home regulator.

Source: ESMA interim MiCA register (CASPS file), read 24 September 2026. The date is the authorisation or notification date recorded by the national authority, and the services each entity may offer vary; the register lists them per entity. A firm's EU entity can passport its services across the EU once authorised.

Do earn, staking and lending products need a MiCA licence?

MiCA has no licence category for earn products as such. Whether an earn, staking or yield feature needs authorisation depends on which of the ten services the firm performs in delivering it, and in particular whether it holds clients' assets or keys, transmits their orders or manages their portfolios. EU authorities have addressed parts of the question in published guidance. Those texts are summarised here as general information, without a legal opinion on any product, and the classification of a specific structure is a matter for national authorities and, ultimately, the courts.

• Staking. In an answer published as ESMA Q&A 2067, the European Commission says MiCA has no staking-specific provisions, so staking "as such is not subject to specific requirements or licensing". Staking offered as a service, where an intermediary stakes clients' assets on their behalf, is described as ancillary to custody and requires authorisation for custody and administration under Article 75. The same answer treats losses from the staking activity as attributable to the CASP.
• Lending and borrowing. Recital 94 states that MiCA "should not address the lending and borrowing of crypto-assets, including e-money tokens". ESMA Q&A 2883 (18 June 2026) confirms that a CASP can offer lending, subject to its general duties under Article 66, the Article 70(1) bar on using client assets for its own account, prior express and specific client consent, and revenues accruing to the client apart from a proportionate fee. It adds that some lending arrangements could meet the definition of an alternative investment fund under the AIFMD.
• Interest on e-money tokens. Article 50 prohibits issuers of e-money tokens, and CASPs providing services related to them, from granting interest. Article 50(3) treats as interest any remuneration or benefit "related to the length of time" a holder keeps the token, including from third parties. How the provision applies to a specific yield product is a matter for the firm's counsel and its national authority.
• Relevant definitions. Article 3(1)(17) defines custody and administration as the safekeeping or controlling, on behalf of clients, of crypto-assets or of the means of access to them. Reception and transmission of orders and portfolio management are separate services under Article 3(1)(16), and Article 2(4) excludes crypto-assets that qualify as financial instruments or fund units from MiCA's scope. Which of these applies to a given product is a matter for the firm's counsel and national authorities.

ESMA's July 2025 statement on CASPs offering unregulated services governs how any product outside MiCA is presented. It asks firms to state the regulatory status of each product at every stage of the sale, keep regulated and unregulated activities in separate website sections, name the entity providing each product, and show a pop-up that clients must acknowledge before accessing an unregulated service. It warns against using MiCA authorisation as a marketing argument for products it doesn't cover.

What MiCA means for EU neobanks and exchanges adding earn

For an EU neobank or exchange adding an earn feature, the classification work centres on how the feature is built. Four design choices come up in most of that analysis:

• Who holds the keys: the distributor, a third-party custodian or the client's own wallet.
• Who chooses the strategy: the client selecting a product, or the firm allocating on a discretionary basis.
• What the client holds: the underlying stablecoin, a lending claim, or a vault share that may itself be a financial instrument.
• What the client is told: the regulatory status, the entity providing the product, and the risks ESMA lists for lending, such as counterparty and collateral shortfall risk.

Our explainer on how neobanks and fintechs offer stablecoin yield covers the commercial models, and Upshift provides vault infrastructure that distributors can run under their own brand.

Frequently asked questions

What is a MiCA licence?

It's authorisation as a crypto-asset service provider under Articles 59 and 63 of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114. It lets a firm provide the services it's authorised for across all EU member states after a passporting notice.

Who needs a MiCA licence?

Any firm providing one of the ten crypto-asset services in Article 3(1)(16), such as custody, exchange, order transmission or portfolio management, to EU clients. Banks, investment firms, e-money institutions and fund managers can notify under Article 60 instead.

How much does a MiCA licence cost?

Minimum capital is EUR 50,000, EUR 125,000 or EUR 150,000 depending on the services (Annex IV), or a quarter of annual fixed overheads if higher. Application and supervisory fees are set by each national regulator.

How long does it take to get a MiCA licence?

Article 63 gives regulators 25 working days to check completeness and 40 working days to decide on a complete file, with a possible 20-working-day suspension for information requests. Preparation of the file often takes longer than the review.

Can crypto firms still operate in the EU without MiCA authorisation?

The transitional period in Article 143(3) ended on 1 July 2026. ESMA expects unauthorised firms to stop onboarding EU clients and wind down, and non-EU firms can serve EU clients only at the client's own exclusive initiative under Article 61.

Is staking regulated under MiCA?

Staking as such isn't subject to specific licensing, according to the Commission's answer in ESMA Q&A 2067. Staking provided as a service on clients' behalf is treated as ancillary to custody, which requires authorisation.

How many firms hold a MiCA licence?

ESMA's interim register listed 362 CASP entries for 357 legal entities on 24 September 2026, including banks and investment firms that notified under Article 60.

Keep reading

• Euro stablecoins compared. Every MiCA euro coin and where each earns yield.
• How the GENIUS Act and CLARITY Act reshape stablecoin yield. The US counterpart to MiCA's stablecoin rules.
• Qualified custodians for onchain yield. How custody-held assets reach vault strategies.