According to Reuters, French Finance Minister Roland Lescure emphasized the need for more euro-issued stablecoins and encouraged banks in the EU to explore tokenized deposits on Friday. This announcement may signal a shift in the French government's and its central bank's stance on the matter. Lescure expressed his support for Qivalis, a consortium of 12 European banks, including BBVA, ING, UniCredit, and BNP Paribas, which plans to launch a euro-pegged stablecoin in the second half of 2026 to counter the dominance of the US in digital payments. "This is what we need, and this is what we want," Lescure stated, also urging banks to further investigate the launch of tokenized deposits.
He noted that the relatively low volume of euro-pegged stablecoins compared to those pegged to the US dollar is "unsatisfactory." This stance differs from that of former Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, who previously spearheaded a strict regulatory approach against privately issued fiat-pegged cryptocurrencies, viewing them as a threat to national sovereignty. More recently, Bank of France Governor Francois Villeroy de Galhau warned of the potential risks of stablecoins and tokenized private money, citing the threat of privatization of money and loss of monetary sovereignty.