EU Deadline to Exit Non-MiCA Stablecoins
ESMA · TradFi · January 8, 2027
MiCA-licensed crypto firms in the EU must wind down client exposure to non-compliant stablecoins such as USDT by January 8, 2027.
On October 8, 2026, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) published an opinion (ESMA75-113276571-1742) on crypto-asset services involving stablecoins that do not comply with MiCA. These are asset-referenced tokens and e-money tokens. ESMA says crypto-asset service providers should not offer any service involving these tokens, including trading, order execution, transfers, custody, advice and portfolio management. National regulators are told to require existing client exposures to be cleared as soon as possible and no later than three months after publication, which means January 8, 2027. After that date, only limited and closely supervised wind-down services are allowed, such as liquidation, conversion, withdrawal or transfer. USDT, the largest stablecoin, has no MiCA authorisation, so this deadline directly affects EU users who hold it on licensed exchanges and brokers.