Overview
- The Wall Street Journal reported on Sept. 18 that European Central Bank president Christine Lagarde privately urged Greek prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis not to approve Binance’s MiCA application, a claim not yet confirmed by the ECB or Greek authorities.
- Binance pulled its application to Greece on June 24, 2026, before the Hellenic Capital Market Commission issued a formal approval or rejection and before the MiCA transition deadline expired.
- Reports say the objections that prompted the intervention focused on Binance’s 2023 U.S. guilty plea over anti-money‑laundering and sanctions failures and on ECB concerns that wider Binance access would deepen use of U.S. dollar stablecoins in Europe.
- Under current MiCA rules national regulators grant crypto licenses while ESMA coordinates supervision, and the episode has renewed debate over a pending proposal to give ESMA direct oversight of the largest providers.
- Since June, Binance has limited EU access by relying on reverse solicitation and routing some business through an Abu Dhabi entity, and ESMA has asked the company for information about whether it properly wound down unlicensed activity as Binance says it will apply in another EU state.