French Finance Minister Roland Lescure emphasized the need for more stablecoins pegged to the euro, urging European banks to explore tokenized deposits, as reported by Reuters. This marks a potential shift in the French government's and its central bank's approach to digital currencies. Lescure expressed 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, aiming to counter US dominance in digital payments. "This is what we need, and this is what we want," Lescure stated, also encouraging banks to further investigate the launch of tokenized deposits.
He noted that the relatively low volume of euro-pegged stablecoins compared to dollar-pegged ones is "unsatisfactory." Previously, former Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire led 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 that stablecoins and tokenized private money could accelerate the loss of monetary sovereignty, framing it as a political threat.