The European Union has granted 244 crypto-asset service provider authorizations under its Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation as of June 29. Germany leads the pack with 57 licenses, roughly 23% of the total, while France trails in second with 26, accounting for about 11%.
Those numbers sound respectable until you zoom out. More than 1,200 entities held national-level crypto registrations before MiCA came along. Only about 17% have successfully converted to the new standard. The rest, some 83% of previously registered virtual asset service providers, are staring down a July 1, 2026 deadline that could force them to stop serving clients across the EU and EEA entirely.
To put the scale of the problem in perspective, Poland alone held over 1,400 legacy VASP registrations before MiCA. The sheer volume of firms that registered under lighter national frameworks, particularly in jurisdictions with lower barriers to entry, always suggested that a significant number wouldn’t survive the transition to stricter pan-European standards.
Germany’s dominance in the licensing count isn’t surprising. The country’s financial regulator, BaFin, has historically been one of Europe’s more proactive authorities when it comes to digital asset oversight. Germany introduced crypto custody licensing requirements back in 2020, giving its domestic industry a head start in navigating compliance infrastructure. The 57 licenses issued there reflect both regulatory maturity and a deep bench of firms that were already operating at a higher compliance standard.
