According to recent reports, French Finance Minister Roland Lescure has emphasized the need for more euro-backed stablecoins in Europe, encouraging banks across the EU to explore tokenized deposits. This shift in stance was expressed on Friday, as reported by Reuters. The minister's support for Qivalis, a consortium of 12 European banks planning to launch a euro-pegged stablecoin in the second half of 2026, aims to counter the dominance of the US in digital payments. Lescure stated, "This is what we need, and this is what we want." He also urged banks to further investigate the launch of tokenized deposits, citing the current low volume of euro-pegged stablecoins compared to dollar-pegged ones as "unsatisfactory." This stance marks a departure from the previous strict regulatory approach led by former Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, who opposed privately issued fiat-pegged cryptocurrencies.
More recently, Bank of France Governor Francois Villeroy de Galhau warned of the potential threats posed by stablecoins and tokenized private money, including the loss of monetary sovereignty.